


what is a king but a heavy name

by thatsarockfact55



Category: Black Sails
Genre: F/F, F/M, Genderqueer Character, Golden Age of Piracy, HE LIVES THE WHOLE TIME, M/M, Multi, Period-Typical Racism, Queer Themes, Rebellion, Slavery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2019-02-10
Packaged: 2019-07-18 22:17:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 50,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16127870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatsarockfact55/pseuds/thatsarockfact55
Summary: In the quiet night, one stranger tells another what he has always known: “I have been so many names, Long John Silver, and if not for love I would be no one at all.”-One story of a spirit, a slave, a father, and a pirate king, told in seven parts.





	1. PART I: OYO-ILE

_“There is not a way to rule without the knowing of where your family will get its next meal — rather, who it will be taken from, or who will become it. The dead, we know, do not hunger for anything but stillness.”_  
_\--Hanif Abdurraqib, “On Hunger”_

 

PART I: OYO-ILE

_“Esu put his hand in his pocket and pulled out the two-colored cap saying, ‘As you can see, one side is white and the other is black. You each saw one side, and, therefore, are right about what you saw.’”_

_\-- “The Two Friends,” a Yoruba folktale_

 

One

             When Enitan’s belly swells for a third time, she cannot bear it. Her breath catches in her chest, and she swallows hard. She will not shed tears over a little nameless thing that has never even cried, not once. _Not yet_ , her traitorous heart whispers.

            Olufemi, as expected, is overjoyed, if painfully so. He is such a handsome and happy man, with his dimples and his cheekbones and his shining eyes. “Again?” he asks, as though he does not dare to believe it. He looks at her wonderingly, nearly dazed. “Ifemi, we will have the strongest, most beautiful child. The orishas have blessed us this time, surely.”

            Enitan arranges her face into a smile that almost matches his. “Yes. Again.”

            Monifa and Bolanle say nothing, just glance at each other while the servants take away their finished bowls of coconut rice. Olufemi teases them and says that they are two old women, for how much they communicate to each other without saying a word. Of course, they are not much older than him, and ignore his teasing as they are wont to do. They are probably thinking about their own children, and how they are beautiful and strong and breathing. In any case, Enitan is grateful for their silence as Olufemi chatters on about announcing the news to his friends and fellow merchants, to the priests, to the local chiefs, to the palace officials, to the stray goat that wanders past their home every morning.

            Enitan does not say a word. She grips her bowl of rice, and resists the urge to throw it against the wall.  

            That night, she dreams of claws snatching her children away, of monsters gobbling babies into their bottomless stomachs. She would like to curse them for it, but when she wakes she knows that no one had stolen her child. No one had eaten her children, either. Enitan’s daughter had died only a few days after she was born, and her son had died after taking only a handful of breaths. No one had taken her children from her, because they had already been possessed by an abiku, a spirit sent from its egbe to disrupt the family’s ile-- it had stolen part of the family’s lineage for its own loot and for its own mysterious society.

           Enitan had kept her daughter in her arms for hours after she had stopped breathing, and she had reached out with shaking hands to hold her boy, who had died before she could feel his little heartbeat. She cannot imagine what sort of riches the abiku could have stolen from her and her family, considering it had passed on so early both times, but she thinks, bitterly, that it had collected all of her tears, her time, the cowry shells spent on the healers, the blood in her mouth from biting her lip too often. Enitan bites her lip, even now. Her little girl had giggled in her lap when Enitan had sneezed, and then, one day, she was so still, and so quiet, and her laugh had haunted Enitan’s dreams for weeks afterwards. She can barely remember her daughter’s laugh, now. She isn’t sure which is more real, the abiku’s child-laugh or the laugh she hears in her dreams. Enitan breathes hard, trying to forget. With her boy, everything had been so red. He had been born all blood, no breath.

            This time, as Enitan’s belly swells, as her feet ache, as her throat burns from retching, she does not hope for anything. The abiku will pretend to be this child, too. It will leave this world behind, rich with stolen goods, its little shell of a body dead in the earth. Then the abiku will return to her belly, and pose as another child, again and again and again. The abiku will take, and take, and take, as much as it pleases. So Enitan decides not to give it anything.

            For five days, she does not leave her bed.

            Olufemi frets and soothes and tries to make her laugh. He kisses her forehead, and Enitan doesn’t even blink.  

            Finally, on the fifth night, Bolanle and Monifa come to her bed.

            “Our husband loves you,” Monifa says, “but he is a bit foolish, yes?”

            Enitan nearly laughs.

            “What you need to do,” Bolanle tells her, “is not to lie in your own stink. You need to trap the abiku, and to tell your child stories.”

            Monifa nods. “What are we made of? The tales our mothers tell us. An abiku will want to know the ending, too. It will want to stay. Speak.”

            Enitan almost shakes her head, but Bolanle grips her hand, and she stops herself.

            “Do you hear it?”

            Enitan frowns at Bolanle. Her voice cracks. “What?”

            Monifa reaches forward, and grips her other hand much too hard. “It is silence, where your voice should be. Your child is waiting for you. We will get a priest, and he will learn the abiku’s secret oaths, and then he will seal its form in the child, or banish it, and you will mollify the baby with your stories. You will.”

            Enitan eyes them warily. They were not cold, during Enitan’s wedding, but they were not friendly, either. Since then, they have remained vaguely interested in her but mainly indifferent, neither jealous of Olufemi’s obvious preference for his newest wife nor eager to strike a friendship.  

            Still. The two old women help her out of bed. Enitan wobbles on her feet, but they steady her.

            “Speak,” Bolanle whispers, and for the rest of the pregnancy, Enitan does not stop telling the abiku--her child-- stories. Enitan sings stories her mother murmured to her before she went to sleep, stories her older brothers and sisters frightened her with, stories of her first husband, killed in a drunken brawl over land, the stupid man. She even passes along gossip she’d heard that day in the marketplace-- there is nothing she will not tell. When Enitan runs out of stories, she conjures her own, and her voice grows hoarse and rasping.  

            The family spends many cowry shells on one of the best priests in Oyo-Ile-- the Babaláwo uses his well-carved Opon Ifa, his voice low and deep as he divines what this abiku intends, as he travels to its hiding places to learn what oaths it swore with its egbe, and Enitan has never prayed so sincerely in her life. She does not care much for the orishas and their worshippers-- she was born to parents with no cowry shells to spare, who had neither planned nor wanted her. Her iya had loved her, eventually, but Enitan still remembers crying and crying and crying, and receiving nothing in answer. Until Olufemi, she had expected her life to go the way the orishas had likely intended it: poor, obscure, and full of the same struggles that strained her baba’s back and stiffened her iya’s fingers. Certainly, until her first husband had died, her life had followed in their weary footsteps. Secretly, Enitan likes to think that meeting Olufemi in the market on that bright, cloudless day was the first step she took against the orishas, and towards a life of her own making. Still. When the Babaláwo prays, she does too. _Please_ , she adds. _Not for my sake. Please, please, please._

            After the Babaláwo leaves, Olufemi traces his fingers across her stomach, and he beams so wide through his tears. He whispers endearments against her skin, and it occurs to Enitan, later, that maybe his joy is not for himself, but for the baby to listen to.

            When their second son is born, just as the rainy season begins, he cries so loud the air shakes. When he is placed in her arms, Enitan cries too.   

            Olufemi wants to give him a safe name. “Ayérunbò,” he whispers against the pulsepoint in her neck. “One who returns from the heavens. Or--” his voice grows cold. “Or Kòséké.” Olufemi breathes hard. He is slow to anger-- Enitan made sure of that, before marrying him-- but now, she sees rage blazing in his eyes, and grief twisting his beautiful face. “Kòséké. There-is-no-hoe. If he dies...if the abiku leaves us again, we will not bury anything.”

           Enitan shakes her head, and kisses his knuckles. “I welcome your fury. I’m angry too. But--” Olufemi frowns, and Enitan shushes him. “Ifemi, we can’t name him out of fear. That name...it promises him nothing.”

           “...Yes,” Olufemi mumbles. “Yes, you’re right.” He breathes slowly, in and out. “Málomé, then. Don’t go anymore.” His voice breaks. “Don’t go.”

            Enitan kisses him and wipes his tears, just has he has wiped hers. She feels her own anger returning, burning her throat. She will not name her child after a plea. She will not beg to anyone to keep him. Not even an abiku. Not even the orishas.

             Many days pass, and after he has breathed countless breaths, Enitan and Olufemi name their second son Ekundayo. Sorrow becomes joy.

Two

            “Abeni, stop that--”

            “What? I can’t hear you.”

            Abeni tugs his little tufts of hair harder, and Ekundayo yelps.

            He can hear the smugness in her voice. “That’s what I thought. That’s what it feels like, when you pull my hair, except my hair is longer, and prettier, and more important--”

            “Folami,” Ekundayo begs as Abeni tugs harder and harder and-- “Help! She’s killing me!”

            No response. Folami’s prayers grow slightly louder from the other side of the room.

            Ekundayo does not know why the orishas have cursed him with two monsters for older sisters, why his life is reduced to nothing but pain--he will be bald for the rest of his life, he swears it--

            “What nonsense is this?”

            Instantly, Abeni lets go. “Iya,” she says almost smoothly, “I was disciplining--”

            “How old are you?” Monifa asks, and Ekundayo seizes the chance to roll away from Abeni’s claw-like hands.

            “Iya, he was--he pulled my hair when I refused to play his silly game, and I only wanted--”

            “You wanted to behave like a child. I understand.” Monifa’s voice is storm-rain, cold and relentless.

             Abeni’s voice is fire. “I am not a child--”

            “Then don’t act like one. Leave.”

            Abeni huffs out of the room, nearly stomping against the cool, hard-packed earthen floor.

            Monifa raises an eyebrow at Folami, who has finally ceased her daily prayers. “Your mother will hear about this.”

            Folami opens her eyes and blinks, as though surprised to see her there. “About what?”

            Monifa snorts. “Don’t pretend. Bolanle will speak with you later. I will make sure of it.”

            “I was only performing my duty--”

            “Prayer does not mean feigning ignorance when someone needs help. I am sure, as you know so much about the orishas, that you realize this. Perhaps you’d be better off praying somewhere else, hm?”

            Folami lets out a long sigh, says nothing, and marches off, back stuff, head held high.

            Ekundayo feels a surge of victory, as though he has conquered another tribe for Oyo, when Monifa’s glare paralyzes him. His smile drops from his face.

            “What did you do to my daughter’s hair?”

            He should’ve known that Monifa would never see things the way he did.

            “She didn’t-- I wanted to hear about Sango and his brother, and she wouldn’t tell me, so I--”

            “So you pulled her hair?”

            Ekundayo squirms under her gaze. “Yes.”

            “Why?”

            “I…” Ekundayo’s previous anger suddenly feels very silly and snuffed out. He curls his hands into fists. “I’m sorry.”

            “Tell that to your sister.” Monifa eyes him curiously, and Ekundayo almost sighs impatiently until she finally speaks again. “Why do you want to know about Sango’s brother?”

            Ekundayo ducks his head as his face heats up. Ifalare and Maja and all of his other older siblings had laughed at him when he used to ask them, before they were married and living in their own nearby homes, and laughing at him there instead.

            Ekundayo forces himself to meet Monifa’s eyes, because she is not a patient woman, especially with him. “Sango breathes fire when he speaks, and commands lightning.” He resists the urge to make the sound effects. “And-- and Sango was fierce in battle, and when he was the Oba, the Alaafin of Oyo, he won us many victories. Until...until he didn’t, and he destroyed his palace by mistake with his magic. And then he died by....”

           Monifa waves her hand. “By hanging himself, yes.”

          “Yes. People loved him, and he’s an orisha now. But Ajaka has no worshippers. Shouldn’t Sango’s brother--shouldn’t he be a god too?”

          Monifa frowns and tilts her head. “You should ask your mother. I don’t know much about Ajaka--Sango’s followers wouldn’t want a rival, that’s for certain.”

          Ekundayo sighs. “I want to know. That’s all.”

          Monifa laughs. “You and Enitan are the same.”

          Ekundayo almost asks, “Is that why you and Bolanle don’t like me?” but instead he laughs too, and rushes off to hurriedly apologize to Abeni. She’s like her mother: she hates waiting.

          Abeni narrows her eyes at his outstretched hand, but she shakes it. “Count yourself lucky.”

          Ekundayo nearly tugs her hair again, but instead he grins. “I can’t wait to hear about Ajaka-- “

         “No one cares about Ajaka,” Folami interrupts, evidently too focused on communing with the orishas and spirits to apologize to him, but not enough to transcend this realm directly.

          Ekundayo curls his lip. “I care about him.”

          Abeni cuts in, rolling her eyes with a flourish. “Sango was a fool, if you ask me-- “

          Ekundayo relaxes as arguments crackle the hot air, and creeps away as his sisters fight in their usual ways, Abeni spitting insults, Folami tilting her head in stiff, almost regal indifference. Their iyas will discipline them, to be sure: Monifa and Bolanle favor their youngest daughters, but they hate the almost-daily shouting matches as much as anyone else in the household.

         Ekundayo retreats to his favorite part of the large, spacious household. He sits in the beam of sunlight surrounded by cool shade, where no one can stop him from asking questions, where no one will interrupt his quiet, where no one can scold him about his too-long hair. He hates that it needs to be shaved so often, according to his iya and his other iyas and his baba. Abeni and Folami and his other sisters can wear their hair in intricate styles-- Abeni with her long braids, Folami with her hair styled almost like the local Sango priests. His mother tells him that he must have both sides of his head shaved for Osanyin, the orisha of medicine. She says this with a little eye-roll every time, as if she doesn’t entirely believe what she’s saying, but she still shushes him whenever he complains, and he has had the same hairstyle his whole life. His hair grows so quickly, and it is shaved just as quickly.

        Later, after the servants have taken away the family’s empty bowls of ofada stew, and for once no one noticed how he had wiped his nose from the spices, Ekundayo curls up next to his mother, and asks in a sleep-thick voice, “Iya, what was Ajaka like?”

        Enitan hums. “Sango’s brother?”

        “Yes.”

        “Let me see,” she says, in the slow voice she uses whenever she is about to tell a story. Ekundayo wriggles closer to her as his baba snores gently--Olufemi tells him stories too, but he always goes to sleep so early, as soon as the stars dot the sky.

       “They say Ajaka was quiet,” Enitan murmurs into the dark, “and as Sango raged, he kept his mouth shut. The people loved Sango more-- he was brave, and conquered many lands for us. He expanded the kingdom, and shook lightning from his staff, and fire blazed from his mouth whenever he spoke.”

       “He seems--” Ekundayo stops.

       “What?”

       “He’s very....angry.”

        Enitan laughs. “Oh, yes. His magic made him powerful, but it also destroyed him. One day, he raged so much that he burned his palace to ash, and all of his wives and children and servants perished in the flames. They say that afterwards, Sango did not say anything to anyone at all, and hung himself where no one could find him and his shame.”

       “Why does he have worshippers, if he was so foolish?”

        “Well,” Enitan smiles darkly, “if you ask me, it’s because he won so many other kingdoms for us, and helped Oyo grow rich and large. He helped give us a way forward, out of provincial misery and to what we were destined to be.”

       “But-- his whole palace-- “

        “I know.” Enitan kisses the top of his head. “I know. But orishas are not like us. They don’t think as we do-- they’re beyond such things. Sango’s worshippers love his power, and his strength, and his cunning. Even his anger. Sometimes, I would like to breathe fire myself.”

        Ekundayo giggles.

        His iya swats at his head, and he yelps. “What--?”

        “You think I cannot be powerful, and angry, and cunning?”

        She says it in a deep and ferocious voice, but her eyes twinkle, and Ekundayo laughs harder. His baba snorts, and they both cover their mouths.

        Once he’s recovered, Ekundayo asks, “What about Ajaka?”

        “Oh, yes,” Enitan says, still smiling. Her voice slows again. “When Sango died, Ajaka became the Alaafin, and everyone thought he was too weak. He gave his power away to the Oyo Mesi and to  his generals, and Oyo suffered for it.” She frowns slightly. “They say he grew more like his brother. He raged, too.”

        Ekundayo fidgets with his hands. “Does he...how does he die?”

        His iya links their fingers together. “Old age.”

        “Really?”

        “Yes.” Enitan holds him closer, almost too tight. “Do you like Ajaka?”

        Ekundayo frowns, and kicks away a beetle that had almost scuttled onto his toe. “Why was he like his brother, later?”

        Enitan pauses. “I don’t know. You can tell stories about Ajaka yourself. He won’t strike you down if you tell it a certain way, like Sango or his worshippers.”

        Ekundayo laughs. “Ajaka won’t burn me to a crisp.”

       “Oh no,” Enitan says, and he can hear the grin in her voice. “Even though you are as tasty as a little roasted plantain.”

       “Iya--” Ekundayo laughs and laughs as Enitan tickles his sides-- “Stop it! I’m not a plantain!”

       After a few merciless moments, she scratches his tiny tufts of hair. “Hm. We’ll shave this tomorrow.”

       Ekundayo huffs. “Iya, please, I like it--”

      “Osanyin likes it shaved.”

      “But I--”

      “No.” Enitan holds him so tightly that Ekundayo can’t breathe. “You’re staying here, with me.”

      “Please--” Ekundayo gasps-- “please, you’re crushing me--”

      Enitan lets him go, but she still holds onto his hands, and kisses his cheek. “Go to sleep.”

      She does not look away from him. Enitan has always watched him, and he has always watched back.

     “Yes, iya, I will.”

      Ekundayo shakes his head. His iya worries too much. He may be an abiku child, but it is sealed within him. His baba tells him that all the time. Ekundayo yawns, and crawls into bed. He isn’t going anywhere.

Three

            In the market, as Olufemi sells his wares, Ekundayo tries to hide from Ige.

            “Come here!” she bellows. “Come here, you worm!”

            Ekundayo keeps still. If he shouts, “I’m not a worm!” then she will find him, and tackle him, and Wúrà isn’t here to help him this time. For someone so small, she is as fierce as the mid-afternoon sun beating down on the marketplace.

            As Ekundayo crouches behind a nearby abandoned cart, he hears his baba say to another customer, “Yes, yes, I was going to become one of the Eso, I swear--if I hadn’t lost this arm, I would be riding on my horse as a war chief--but what can you do. You’ll take these necklaces, yes? For an old soldier’s honor?”

           Ekundayo looks around for signs of Ige, bored already despite his fear. He’s heard his baba tell this tale countless times: as a young man, he worked his way through the ranks of the cavalry, fought in many battles, helped to expand the empire, and nearly became one of the Eso, an elite unit of cavalry soldiers, until some Tapa soldier stabbed him through his arm in an unexpected skirmish at the border. Ekundayo listens for one more moment-- yes, this is the part when his baba mentions to a new customer that “I lost an arm, but I’ve gained strong wives, and strong children, and a surplus of yams from the best farmers, priced for your ease and convenience.” Ekundayo curls up behind the rickety cart, ducking his head, willing himself to become a stone, or a sack of rice. He’s very careful not to slap the mosquito away when it lands on his knee. He feels it draw his blood, and then he waits, and waits, and waits, until--

        “Found you!”

_Oh no_ , _no no no no no no--_

        He can’t get away in time-- she’s too fast--

        Ige grabs his leg, and pulls her to him, and Ekundayo curses and hits her hand, but it doesn’t work, and she’s dragging him-- she thinks it’s fun, to terrorize him--

       “Hey!”

       Ekundayo yells, “What took so long?”

       “Iya needed me to watch the cart as she chased down a thief!”

       Wúrà dashes over and grabs Ige from behind, and she lets go of Ekundayo with a curse.

      “Stop-- stop grabbing me!”

       Wúrà lets go, and Ige falls on her behind, and Ekundayo manages through his laughter, “You shouldn’t have grabbed _me_.”

       Ige glares at them both, her round face pinched in fury. “I don’t deserve this--”

       “Who’re you to decide?” Wúrà asks, grinning in triumph.

       Ige pushes herself off of the ground, fists clenched tight, braids askew. “I decide because you pushed me! I fell, and I don’t deserve it, because--”

      “Because you say so.” Ekundayo tilts his head. “So why do you have to chase me every time we’re in the marketplace? Do I deserve to be chased?”

       Ige rolls her eyes. “I like to.”

       “You’re evil.”

       Ige’s eyes widen. “You’re evil for even saying that!”

       Wúrà squeezes Ekundayo’s shoulder. “Good one.”

           Ekundayo grins at him. “Thanks.” He turns to Ige. “No, you’re evil.”

            “No you are!”

            “No you!”

            “I’m not--you’re an abiku--I’m going to tell my iya and baba about this, and all of my sisters--”

           “Let’s go,” Ekundayo whispers to his friend, so they wander away from Ige and her tantrum, and ignore her shouts. No one knows why Ige is so angry-- her family is respectable, involved in trade and taxes across multiple provinces, and her sisters are all pleasant whenever anyone sees them about.

            “I heard,” Ekundayo says, once they have found some shade that’s still within earshot of Olufemi and the other merchants, “that Ige bit her mother as soon as she was born.”

             Wúrà giggles, and Ekundayo glows.

             “I heard,” Wúrà manages through his laughter, “that Ige’s only friend is the rock she throws at people who look at her the wrong way.”

            “I heard that Ige’s sisters are all blessed with good fortune, and when the orishas saw Ige, they did nothing but laugh.”

             “I heard that Ige--”

             “I heard that!”

              Wúrà and Ekundayo jump, but then they relax: Ige’s being led away by her family.

              “I heard you!” she yells again, though there’s something odd about her voice. It almost sounds like she has a cold.

              Ekundayo shrugs-- she won’t bother them now, anyway--and leans his cheek against Wúrà’s shoulder, suddenly drowsy. Wúrà is taller, and stronger, and bigger, and Ekundayo thanks the orishas every day that his family and Wúrà’s family have been friends for generations, and that Wúrà is his friend, and not Ige’s.

             “Want to hear a story?” he mumbles.

             “Maybe later,” Wúrà shrugs, and Ekundayo lifts his head off of his shoulder, trying not to feel the disappointment sink through his chest.

             Wúrà frowns slightly, and when he stands, he offers his hand to Ekundayo’s. “Want to wrestle?”

             Ekundayo takes his hand, stands up, and winks. “Maybe later.”

             Wúrà shakes his head, but he smiles, too. “You’re insufferable. You and Ige are the same: so stubborn, and covered in dust.”

             Ekundayo shoves him. “She dragged me around, I couldn’t stop her--”

             Wúrà steadies him before Ekundayo inevitably trips. “That’s why you should wrestle, you need to grow stronger--”

             “I’m strong.” Wúrà raises an eyebrow, and Ekundayo adds hastily, “Just in other ways.”

             “Sure.”

             “I am!”

             “Yeah? Prove it.”

             Ekundayo squares his shoulders, looks Wúrà right in the eye, and...and he can’t help it, he laughs.

             “What’s that supposed to be?” Wúrà grins. “Are you laughing at yourself?”

            “No, no, you’re just--” Ekundayo wills himself to stop giggling. “You’re very funny.”

            “Why, because I think you can be strong?”

            “No, because you think I need to prove myself.”

            “How else will anyone-- how else will Ige stop bothering you, hm?”

            “Ige doesn’t know true strength--”

            “Boys! We’re finished for the day!”

             Olufemi and Wúrà’s iya, Ranti, beckon them, and before they part Ekundayo swears to Wúrà, “I’ll show you my strength soon.”

            “Really?”

            Ekundayo smiles, and ducks his head, because Wúrà teases him, but he’s always so kind about it. “Yes.”

            Ekundayo’s fingers slip from Wúrà’s, and he helps his baba push his big cart back home.

            Olufemi carries pouches of cowry shells, and as they near their home, he bends low and kisses the top of Ekundayo’s head.

            “Baba! I’m too old for that.”

            “Oh, yes,” Olufemi smiles, and then he wipes his eyes with the back of his hand--he cries at every occasion. “But you’re my boy, and I’m glad you have a friend like Wúrà.”

            Ekundayo smiles. “Me too.”

            “Now help me with this cart-- we have my parents visiting, and you know your iya-nla. She won’t want to miss seeing you.”

Four

            One night, Ekundayo can’t sleep. He always has vivid dreams, but he can usually fall asleep afterwards, and forget most of what he’d dreamt. This time, his eyes stay open. Abeni and Folami can’t sleep either, so as their parents snore on, and after the servants have scolded them already to go back to their beds, the three of them sit and talk.

            “What’d you dream about?” Folami asks.

            Ekundayo sighs and rubs his eyes. “It had just rained. I could taste it in my mouth. There was mist, and...in the bush there was something moving. I wanted to find out what it was, and just as I was about to reach the bush I woke up.”

            Abeni yawns. “That’s not nearly as fun as my dream.”

            Folami waves her hand, and looks at Ekundayo solemnly. “It’s good that you woke up. That was the abiku, trying to escape. It loves the bush, and other wild places.”

            Ekundayo shrugs, and tries to swallow down his lingering, leftover sense of regret. “Yes. Well, I’m here now. No bush in sight.”

            After a moment, Abeni throws her arm around his shoulders. “I’m glad you’re here, too.”

            Ekundayo squirms. “Why?”

            Abeni lets him go and grins. “So you can listen to my dream.”

            “Ugh.”

            Folami ignores him. “What did you dream about?”

            Abeni spreads her hands wide. “I dreamt that I was a potter, and a beautiful woman stepped into my little shop, requesting a bowl with carvings depicting the world’s creation, and a pot that could clean itself.”

            Ekundayo sighs. Abeni always dreams about beautiful women. He tries not to focus on his dream--it wasn’t particularly interesting, or terrifying, and yet...if he had just reached forward--

            “...so then I had to ask Tortoise to help me get some magic, and you know how Tortoise is in the stories, always up to his old tricks…”

            Maybe the abiku wanted the same things he did. Maybe it was lonely, like he was sometimes, and maybe it wanted to find a companion in the wild. Just for a little while. Just in his dreams.

            “...I told the woman that I could carve the bowl, but that I would need her help with the magic pot. And then she laughed, and as she laughed she changed…”

            What was in that bush? It was wild, yes, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t tame it. He lives in the capital of an empire; there’s nothing he can’t do. Maybe the abiku wanted to show him something. If he just went to sleep again…

            “So,” Folami asks, “what do you think your dream means?”

            Abeni smirks. “It means that I like a challenge.”

            Folami snorts, and Abeni laughs, and Ekundayo is startled out of his almost-sleep.

            “Did…” he yawns. “Did you dream anything, Folami?”

            “No,” she says, clipped. “No, nothing yet. Someday, the orishas will speak to me, and I will be a priestess. Just...not right now.”

            Abeni pats her shoulder. “You’ll be the best priestess in Oyo-Ile.”

            Folami glances at her sister, oddly shy, even tremulous. “Thank you.”

            Abeni squeezes her hand, and adds, “As soon as you learn to relax.”

            Before Folami can snap anything back, Ekundayo asks, “When did you get your scars?”

            His sisters look at him. “What?”

            “You know.” Ekundayo touches his cheeks. “These.”

            “Oh.” Abeni traces the three vertical marks running down both sides of her face. “Hm...when I was younger than you are, I think.”

            “Yes,” Folami nods. “It’s the same for me.”

            Ekundayo frowns, and fidgets with his hands. “Why don’t I have our scars yet?”

            Abeni and Folami look at each other, and then Folami asks, “What prompted this?”

            “I’ve been thinking about it for a while. Even Ige has the tribe’s scars. Is it...is it because I’m-- ?”

            “I don’t think it’s because you have an abiku sealed in you,” Folami answers swiftly. “Your iya and baba would want to have you marked, so it’s further sealed. Maybe...maybe it’s because…?”

            “You’re the baby,” Abeni finishes. “The youngest, I mean. Baba dotes on you. Maybe he doesn’t want to hurt you.”

            “But I need them. I need those marks, if I belong here.” Ekundayo frowns. “In my dream...I wanted to go to the bush. I wanted to explore it, just for a little while.”

            Folami holds his hand. “Talk to your iya and baba in the morning. We can’t have you going away.”

            “No,” Abeni says, as she puts an arm around his shoulder, this time much more gently. “You’re staying right here. I need to give _someone_ orders in this house. The servants don’t listen to me, and Folami doesn’t either--”

            “Nor should I. You’re only a year older, and hardly more mature.”

            Ekundayo closes his eyes as Folami and Abeni whisper to each other, and he doesn’t dream of the bush again. He feels strong arms carry him to bed, and he feels warm, and safe, and he falls asleep with a blessing in his ears.

Five

            “...Yes, but the man is rich! The boy should kill his baba and join his new one. Simple.”

            “No,” Ige shoots back while Wúrà frowns at her. “The boy shouldn’t kill his baba, he’s his blood. He isn’t a good baba, but he says he’ll treat his son better. The rich man dressed the boy up in nice clothes, and fed him, but what if he has secret plans for the boy? The rich always have secret plans.”

            Wúrà rolls his eyes. “Ige, your family is rich.”

            “All of our families are rich. So you know that what I say is true.”

            “But it’s better to live with a rich family with secrets than with a family that hunts rats for a living, and that left the boy to die...for a rat. Come on, Ayo, what do you think? You told us this story.”

            “Iya heard it in the market once, from some traveler,” Ekundayo shrugs. “It’s supposed to end on that question: Which baba should the boy kill, and which one should he claim, his own blood who left him, or a rich noble who claimed him? I can’t answer, that’d ruin the tale.”

            Ige throws up her hands, working herself into her usual temper. Very rarely, there are bouts of calm with her, like when Ekundayo apologized for calling her names, or when he is in the middle of telling a story, and she must hear it from the beginning, because the market is dull today.

            “That’s ridiculous,” she huffs. “The boy should clearly return to his baba, and kill the rich man--they can steal his possessions, or-- oh! Maybe the boy can say that his baba killed the rich man, and his rat-catcher baba will be killed, and then the boy can say that he’s the heir to the rich man’s fortunes, and be a noble. I’ve solved it.”

            Wúrà shakes his head. “Multiple killings don’t solve anything.”

            “It does in a story.”

            “No, it doesn’t--”

            “If you can’t see that I’m right, then I’m leaving.” Ige stands, and right before she leaves, she adds, “Thank you for the story. It was…decent.”

            Before Ekundayo can splutter out a shocked, “Thank you for listening,” Ige has already marched off.

            Wúrà bursts out laughing. “Just a few weeks ago, she was dragging you around by your foot, and now she’s thanking you?”

            Ekundayo puffs out his chest. “I’m very persuasive.”

            “Oh yes. Very strong.”

            Ekundayo grins. “My words are my strength. Haven’t I proven that to you?”

            Wúrà smiles. In the morning light, his dark skin, almost as dark as Ekundayo’s, glows, and his eyes gleam. “You don’t have to prove anything to me. You’re my friend.”

            Something warm settles in Ekundayo’s chest. He says, “Thank you,” in the hushed voice he prays in.

            They walk through the bustling marketplace, but Ekundayo isn’t paying attention to any of it, not to the crowd, not to the merchants, not to the nobles or the soldiers or the servants or the slaves, not even to the priests and priestesses.

            When they reach a quieter section of the marketplace, Wúrà says, “Tell me another story.”

            He’s usually too tired for wrestling or other games in the morning, so Ekundayo says, “Of course.” He stops them off to the side, in the shade. He closes his eyes, and speaks in a slow voice. “Once, there was a man named Sango.”

            “Oh, I know him-- “  

            Ekundayo holds up his hand, and Wúrà quiets. “This isn’t about Sango. This story is about his brother, Ajaka.”

            “Sango had a brother?”

            “Yes. Once, there was a man named Sango, who later became an orisha. He had a brother, Ajaka, who did not become anything. He was quiet. He didn’t like war, not as much as Sango did. Everyone thought Ajaka was weak. Even his servants mocked him His wives scorned him. The whole kingdom loved Sango more. He breathed fire, and cast lightning upon our enemies, and won many wars. But then…”

           “But then?”

          “But then Sango burned his whole palace. He was so angry, and he couldn’t stop his magic this time. His wives were ash. His servants and slaves were ash. The gardens were ash. Everything was gone.”

         “What about Ajaka?”

         “Ajaka lived!”

         Wúrà gasps. “How?”

         “He was hiding away from everyone who had scorned him-- he had never been brave, and it had saved his life. When he returned to the palace, there was no one left to mock him. Ajaka smiled in the silence, and he became the Alaafin.”

         “Why isn’t he an orisha too, if he became the Alaafin after Sango?”

         Ekundayo smiles. “On the day he became the Alaafin, Ajaka took a deep breath-- he didn’t want to forget his victory, and he had just eaten a big meal. But he breathed in too much of his brother’s ash, and he became angry and foolish, too. He didn’t have any magic, and he gave his power away to fools. That’s why Ajaka isn’t an orisha.”

         Ekundayo opens his eyes, and--he blinks. Wúrà is so close.

        “Is that true?”

        Ekundayo grins. “You know how stories go: they could be true, but they don’t have to be.”

       “Ayo, tell me!”

       “No,” Ekundayo tells him. “You have to decide.”

       “But-- that’s so annoying!”

       “Yes,” Ekundayo laughs, “it is.” He pulls Wúrà closer to him, in case he decides to stomp off too. “Thank you,” he says quietly. “Thank you for listening.”

       “Of course.” Wúrà gazes down at him. “I’d listen to you tell any story.”

        Ekundayo feels his face heat up, and before he can say anything, his best friend tackles him to the ground.

       “Now,” Wúrà whispers into his ear, “we wrestle.”

        Ekundayo slips out from underneath him, and goes for Wúrà’s legs-- if he can’t beat him on strength, he might beat him on cunning.

        They fight-- Wúrà punches his nose, and Ekundayo shoves him into the ground, and after a few breathless moments, Ekundayo pants, “I think-- I can’t-- Wúrà, you win.”

        Wúrà breathes hard. He spits blood onto the ground, and beams. “You almost had me there. But I got you.”

        “You did.”

         They sit against a cool wall, catching their breath. Ekundayo wipes his nose, and Wúrà brushes dirt off of his clothes.

         The morning light is brighter now. Wúrà is shining.

         Ekundayo reaches towards him, and touches his face. “You have your scars.”

         Wúrà nods, and stills. “Yes. I got them three days ago.”

        “They’re beautiful.”

         Wúrà winces when Ekundayo traces the grooves in his cheeks. “They hurt.”

        “Sorry.” Ekundayo pulls his hands away, but then Wúrà takes them in his own.

        “It’s alright.”

        Their foreheads are touching.

       “Tell me another story?”

       “Once,” Ekundayo breathes, “there were two friends.”

       “And?”

       Ekundayo pulls him close, and kisses him. It’s for the briefest of moments, but Wúrà kisses him back.

       Then Ekundayo murmurs, “And one of them won a wrestling match.”

       “Which one?”

       Ekundayo grins. “What do you think?”

       Eventually, they walk back to their parents, giggling and giddy, shocked and pleased with themselves. When they part, Ekundayo feels Wúrà’s hand in his, even after he’s gone.

       Enitan frowns at him as she attaches the cart to their new mule. “What is it? And why are you covered in dirt? What’s this blood on your nose-- did you win?”

       The sun beams against them. Ekundayo says, “Iya, I am ready for my scars.”

       Enitan grips his shoulder through it all. Monifa and Bolanle hold him down, Abeni and Folami whisper that it will be over soon, and Olufemi gets the fire going. It hurts-- it burns-- but when it is over, when Ekundayo touches his cheeks, and feels the stinging scars, he thinks, _These are just like Wúrà’s. These are just like my family’s_ , and he smiles through his tears. He is here. He is here, and that night he dreams of nothing.

Six

        After his iya-nla and his baba-obi and his older siblings and all of his other relatives and friends of the family leave, kissing his cheek and patting his head and calling him a man of the tribe now, after the celebratory feasts are over, Ekundayo sleeps for a whole day.

        When he wakes, Bolanle yells, “Ekundayo! Help me sell these.”

         Ekundayo groans, still stuffed from bowls and bowls of jollof rice, perfectly cooked, and creamy moin moin wrapped delicately in banana leaves, and cow, sliced thinly in tsire-style, skewered over the fire and seasoned with chili and peanut oil.

        “My face...it hurts.”

         He hears Bolanle tut in the other room. “And? You can walk. You can carry the wares. You can speak to customers.”

        “But-- “

        “We’re leaving.”

        Ekundayo curses under his breath, and gets up from bed, ignoring the headache from the palm wine. Enitan would let him rest. Olufemi would let him rest. Why do Monifa and Bolanle always treat him like a servant?

       “Stop dragging your feet, and get the mule. We have many things to sell.”

        The market is as busy as ever, but Ekundayo sees Wúrà and his baba, and waves. He’s about to ask Wúrà if he wants to find Ige and poke her with a stick, but Bolanle says, “Oh no. You’re working with me today.”

       “It will only take a moment--”

       “Olufemi spoils you-- do you even know how to sell yams?”

        “I’m not spoiled--”

        “Watch, listen, and learn.”

         Ekundayo grumbles under his breath, but he stays put. Monifa, at least, would give him a better reason to stay behind. Bolanle never minces words.

          A woman and her husband idle past their wares.

          Bolanle smiles wide, and suddenly her voice is bright and breezy. “You like our yams, yes?"

The woman picks a yam from the pile. “Hm. Could be riper.”

          “Ah, but you want to wait. These are from Debo’s farm.”

           “Debo?” the man asks. “Why should I care about his farm?”

            Bolanle smiles wide. “I’m surprised, sir, that you don’t know who Debo is. He is famous for his yams-- he has acres of land, and ever since his home burned, all he does is grow the sweetest yams in this land, I tell you. I have eaten them myself.”

            “Really?”

            “It is the truth.”

            She speaks with such easy confidence that the woman and her husband buy five, and Ekundayo collects the cowry shells in one of their pouches.

            “Do you know Debo?” he asks, once the customers have wandered off.

            Bolanle shrugs. “I’ve met him once. Half of his face is burned, and he treats his yams like his children.”

            “Are they really that sweet?”

            Bolanle leans down, and whispers, “I’ve never eaten his yams.”

            Ekundayo’s eyes widen. “Won’t they know you’re lying?”

            Bolanle cackles. “A little lie here and there won’t stop the cowries from coming. How do you think your baba sells so many little sculptures of Sango and Osun and the rest? It’s not because he has made them all, or watched the carver shape them. It’s because he talks about the wars he’s fought in, and the gods he prayed to in battle.”

            Ekundayo wipes the sweat from his forehead. “He does talk to customers about his arm a lot.”

            A smirk twitches across Bolanle’s lined mouth. “He certainly does.”

            After a few more customers buy more of their necklaces, and beans, and sculptures, Bolanle tells him, “You sell something now. Bring the people to you.”

            Ekundayo nods, no longer irritated, the sleep vanishing from his eyes. He swallows, and thinks. Olufemi always treats customers like old friends, his smiles big and his laugh loud and gregarious. When Enitan takes him to the market, she is smooth as water, and talks to customers like they’ve already purchased her wares. Abeni brags about all of their items, and Folami often gets in long discussions with priests and priestesses about how they will speak to spirits better if they just purchase this necklace.

            Ekundayo clears his throat, and calls out to an elderly man, “Would you like some yams?”

            The old man walks past him.

            “He didn’t hear you,” Bolanle says. “Speak louder.”

            Ekundayo huffs. “I knew that.”

            “Oh, you did? Then you won’t need my help getting customers. Go on.”

            “I didn’t mean--”

            Bolanle raises an eyebrow, and says nothing.

            Ekundayo almost stomps off, but then he takes a breath, and surveys the marketplace.

            A soldier laughs when Ekundayo starts talking about his yams, a priestess tells him that he is too small to talk that big, a drunk spits at his feet, and a wealthy farmer shouts from his own cart, “Don’t bother, little boy!”

            Bolanle says nothing, just watches Ekundayo as he curses under his breath and eyes the pitiful amount of cowries they’ve collected so far.

            He squints against the sun as a young woman glides through the crowd, and Ekundayo squares his shoulders and raises his voice. He’s tried being friendly, he’s tried being fun, he’s tried bragging, and he’s tried suggestion, and none of it has worked. He glances back at Bolanle, who’s leaning against their cart and dozing off.

           Does she really think so little of him?

           Ekundayo yells to the young woman, “E ku osan! Good afternoon; would you like to hear about the man who made these bracelets, the man with one eye and hands blessed by the orishas?”

           The woman turns towards him, and Ekundayo stops fidgeting with his hands. She comes to their cart, eyebrow raised, with sweeping robes and intricately styled braids. “E ku osan. What man is this?”

           Ekundayo bows, and looks her right in the eye, though it’s difficult on account of her beauty. He swallows, fights against the heat in his cheeks, and announces, “His name is Sadare, and he was once a lowly farmer. He had four older brothers, and his family doted upon them all, and left him to do servants’ work…until one night, Sadare met Ogu, a warrior orisha, master of tools…”

           Ekundayo keeps talking, until a father and his son stop to listen, and a pair of old women pause to hear him, and a priest watches him with amused interest. He talks, and talks, and talks, until  the sun hangs lower in the sky, and he’s sold twelve bracelets, seven necklaces, and thirteen yams.

           Bolanle startles awake in the middle of him collecting the cowries for the yams. She blinks, and sees the cart, and the customers bustling away, and the pile of cowries. “So,” she smiles, “you finally learned how to sell our wares. Did you learn your style?”

         “Yes,” Ekundayo grins as he feeds the mule and prepares to pack away their things. “They like listening to a good story, whether it’s a lie or not.”

         “Good,” Bolanle says, and it’s the first time Ekundayo can remember her ever complimenting him.

         “What’s this?” he gasps. “Are you going to say you don’t hate me, now?”

          Bolanle nearly spits out the palm wine she’d started sipping. “What?”

         “You know,” Ekundayo shrugs, “you and Monifa, you both-- “

        “Hate you?” Bolanle finishes hitching the mule to the cart, and frowns. “Child, we don’t hate you. We never...is that what you think?”

         “I don’t know,” Ekundayo mumbles. “You always give me more work to do. Monifa yells at me whenever Abeni is...well, Abeni. And neither of you like how baba loves Enitan more than you.”

         He doesn’t mean to say that last part.

         The silence rings in his ears.

         Distantly, Ekundayo hears a noise. Someone is laughing.  

         Bolanle is laughing. Bolanle is...laughing?

        “What-- ?”

        “If you think we are jealous of your mother...you’ve never been more wrong.”

        “But-- “

        “We’ve never hated you. When your mother...hm. Ask Enitan. It is her story to tell.”

        They leave the market, Ekundayo’s rush of victory replaced by a swarm of confusion buzzing in his head.

        “Iya,” he asks later, “what did she mean?”

        Enitan sighs. “Before you were born...we didn’t seal the abiku yet.”

         “Yes.”

         “I lost a daughter and a son. You...the spirit left them behind.”

         “Yes.”

          “I was so afraid.” His iya blinks hard. “Monifa and Bolanle had never treated me badly-- they cared about Olufemi, but they were closer to each other, and he treated them fairly enough. And then...they said to tell you stories. So that this time, when the priest came, you would stay, and listen to the end.” Enitan pauses. “They don’t say it, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t love you.” She wipes her eyes. “They loved you before I could.”

          Ekundayo doesn’t really believe it-- Monifa and Bolanle will always love their own children more than anyone else-- but still, he wipes his mother’s tears.

          “Thank you, iya.”

           She kisses his forehead. “We’ll go to the market tomorrow, and you can show me what you’ve learned, and then you can watch a real master.”

           Ekundayo laughs, and in the dawn, before he leaves with his iya, he swears Bolanle winks.

Seven

            A few months pass, and Ekundayo is nearly twelve. He is up late with Abeni and Folami again, the servants rolling their eyes as they go to their quarters.

            “But what if it does happen? What if...what if--?”

            Abeni shushes him. “The abiku left very early, both times. That’s what everyone says. You’re not a baby. You’re growing into a young man.”

            Folami says, “The family has taken all of the necessary precautions. We honor the orishas. You are healthy, and strong. We’ll celebrate your birth on the first day of the rainy season. The feast will be massive. The abiku will be sealed within you forever, after that. It can’t leave once you turn twelve.”

            “I can’t wait to drink the palm wine--”

            “Abeni!”

            “What? It’s delicious, and you know...I’m seventeen, and old enough to court Taiwo, so I am old enough to drink some palm wine.”

            Ekundayo drops his mouth open while Folami whisper-yells, “You’re going to court Taiwo?”

            Abeni scoffs. “It’s not official, stop staring at me like there’s been a death in the family. He hasn’t spoken to baba yet, and we haven’t fully decided, but...it seems to be the best choice.”

            “But--” Folami stops, then begins again. “I know you’ve been friends for some time, but won’t he...aren’t you…?”

            Abeni grins. “He prefers the company of men. And he has a sister. A twin, as yet unmarried.”

            “That is…” Folami shakes her head, and Ekundayo can’t believe anything that is happening in front of his eyes, because Folami is giggling. “You are ridiculous.”

            “I’m practical.”

            “You’re a fool.”

            Abeni grins. “I like a challenge.”

            When they have stopped their muffled laughter, Ekundayo asks, “Will you visit?”

            He doesn’t mean for his voice to sound so small, but Abeni smiles softly at him, and tugs his ear. “Little brother,” she says, “I will always visit. Besides, I’ll live here for a while yet. We aren’t in a hurry.”

           They watch a spider crawl up the wall on the other side of the room. None of them try to stop it, and instead they listen to the snores of their parents in their chambers.

           “I dreamt of Yemoja,” Folami says, voice hushed. “I was standing where the river meets the sea, and I was eating kola nuts, even though they are bitter, and she rose from the depths. She didn’t say anything, but-- but there she was.”

          “I knew it would happen,” Abeni beams, squeezing Folami until she coughs. “I knew you’d be chosen.”

         “Priestess of Yemoja, orisha of rivers, women, the moon, and great mysteries, mother of orishas and all of us.” Ekundayo looks at Folami with wide eyes. “You suit her.”

          Folami smiles, something secret and tucked-away gleaming in her dark eyes. “Thank you.”

         “What’s your news?” Abeni nudges Ekundayo. “What is keeping you awake?”

         “It’s not the bush,” he says, and his sisters relax. “It’s...I keep praying to Esu.”

         “The trickster?”

         “Yes.”

         “Why?”

         “I’ve always prayed to him, but now...I think he can help me, and make the abiku stay.”

         “How can an orisha of lies and deceit help you?” Folami asks, frowning. “They say abikus are children of Esu; is this another trap?”

         Ekundayo shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I prayed to him before I...before Wúrà and I…and nothing bad came of it, we are best friends, so-- “

        “We are happy for you and Wúrà,” Folami says, “but I think you should be wary, all the same. Esu is not evil, but he is not kind, either.”

        “I’m afraid,” Ekundayo mumbles. “I’m afraid that I will be gone before the rainy season. Esu controls crossroads, and pathways. He can show me a way.”

        Abeni lets him rest his head on her broad shoulder, and whispers, “You’re going to be fine. Go to sleep now, you need your strength.”

        Ekundayo doesn’t want to close his eyes-- he wants to laugh with his sisters while they pass joke-secrets between each other like palm wine, and he wants them to stay in the house forever. He doesn’t want to be afraid anymore. He doesn’t want his parents to worry. He wants to wrestle and tell stories with Wúrà, and to tease Ige before she smacks him, and to listen to his baba’s booming laugh in the marketplace tomorrow.

        Before long, Ekundayo yawns, and surrenders to the murky dark behind his eyelids.

Eight

            The first day of the rainy season passes. Ekundayo is twelve.

            Enitan cries and cries, and holds him too tightly.

            Olufemi beams, Monifa squeezes his shoulder, Bolanle gives him a necklace, and Folami and Abeni tease them all for worrying. His older siblings send good tidings with gifts and blessings.

            Ekundayo feels lighter than he’s ever been.

            An ordinary day has never made him so happy.

Nine

            Another year passes. Ekundayo grows taller, much to Wúrà’s dismay, and to Ige’s outrage. Abeni marries Taiwo, and he is a big and strong and teasing warrior, just like Abeni, so everyone likes him, and all of his family’s cowries. They like his twin, Kehinde, too, who collects taxes and spends frugally and laughs at all of Abeni’s jokes.  Folami prays more and more often, hoping to become a priestess, hoping to remember her dreams.

            After a day of wrestling with Wúrà, and holding his hand, and laughing when Ige complains that she is shorter than both of them now, and selling some wares with his baba, Ekundayo listens to his iya tell him stories. He doesn’t curl against her like he used to, but he sits and listens.

            “...and that is how wisdom spilled into the world.”

            Ekundayo yawns. “You said a trader told you this?”

            “Yes. She gave me leather for my carvings, and we told some tales.”

            “Anansi’s son is wiser than he is.”

            “Yes. One cannot keep wisdom to himself.”

            Ekundayo grins. “That isn’t very wise.”

            “No, it isn’t.”

            “Would you…” Ekundayo struggles not to yawn a second time. “Would you mind telling me the story of the two friends?”

            “With the hat of two colors? Of course.” She kisses his forehead. “Once, there were two friends, and they loved each other so much that they swore a sacred oath that nothing will come between them...Esu heard this, and he schemed and schemed…”

            When the tale is finished, and just before Ekundayo drifts off, Enitan says, “We are leaving for the market in the morning, don’t forget. You still need to learn from a master.”

            “Yes, yes, I know.”

            “Good.”

            He can hear her smile as he falls asleep.

Ten

            He is thirteen.

            It is the rainy season. The sky is gray and thick with fat clouds.

            He is walking with his iya to the marketplace, walking on the path he has always walked, the earth hard-packed and damp and well-worn with footprints and hoofprints.

            The mule bays.

            The cart shakes.

            Ekundayo stops to adjust the mule’s harness. His iya is making sure nothing has fallen out out of the cart.

            They come for him.

            They are very efficient.

            There is cloth over his eyes, stuffed in his mouth-- he can’t see, he is grabbed, he is shaking, he is twisting and trying, trying, trying to run--

            Enitan screams. She is fighting too--a man curses through a busted lip, and another one hits the ground with a loud groan--she screams and screams--and then….the sound is fading. He is being dragged away from her.

            Ekundayo did not say goodbye, when he had left in the morning.

            That is the last thought he has before his head is smacked with something heavy, before he stops struggling to glimpse her one last time.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've wanted to write this fic since season 1, and part of it is finally here! Thanks so much to ophelia-thinks, professor-no, gloriousginger, and withswords for supporting this, for reading this fic, for offering feedback, and for being awesome friends, people, and writers. 
> 
> This is by no means The Definitive fic about this character: let's be real, I'm a white, American cis woman, there is no way I could write the best or most accurate or only way to write a fic about him. I've done research, but let me know what I've fucked up, and I'll credit you if you want and correct the fic accordingly. My hope is that there are many, many more fics for this character, for his family, and for more characters of color on Black Sails. If you enjoy any Black sails fic by and about people of color, feel free to let me know, and I'll rec them on my blog, toomanyfeelings5, and throughout the Notes section of this fic. I'm obviously not famous or particularly  
> influential, but I will certainly do my best. 
> 
> Comments, constructive criticism, kudos, reblogs, etc, are greatly appreciated.
> 
> Flint talks about how the British Empire is not inevitable, and Madi responds by saying that we need to see the world not as it is, but how it should be. Nothing about "Mr. Scott" and his story are inevitable. The racist way he's written in canon is not inevitable. His death is not inevitable. His is a story that is full of possibilities, and I hope that there are many, many, many more fics about him and his family in the future. 
> 
> WORKS THAT GREATLY INFLUENCE THIS FIC THAT YOU SHOULD READ IF YOU ENJOY IT EVEN A LITTLE BIT:
> 
> 1\. An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon  
> 2\. The Killing Moon by NK Jemisin (let's be real, everything she's ever written)  
> 3\. Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorofor  
> 4\. Hamilton's Battalion by Rose Lerner, Courtney, Milan, and Alyssa Cole  
> 5\. Barracoon by Zora Neale Hurston  
> 6\. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston  
> 7\. "The Outing" by James Baldwin, from Going to Meet the Man  
> 8\. The Sorcerer to the Crown by Zen Cho  
> 9\. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs  
> 10\. The Garries and Their Friends by Frank J. Webb  
> 11\. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Written by Himself.  
> 12\. Frankenstein by Mary Shelly  
> 13\. The Annotated African American Folktales Anthology, edited by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Maria Tatar  
> 14\. The entire syllabus for Race, Class, and Gender in the Atlantic World; hit me up for articles if you want


	2. PART II: AWAY

PART II: AWAY

_“In the nothing, becoming nothing,_

_begetting nothing.”_

_\-- Chris Abani, “Chant:”_

           

One

            It’s alright. He will die soon.

            Or baba will tell his fisherman friends and his sailor friends, and iya will tell her trader friends and her law friends, and everyone will tell the priests and the priestesses, and Folami will come to him on Yemoja’s command, and Abeni will swim out to him, knife tucked away in her skirts, and Ige will charge in with rocks the size of her head, and Wúrà will take his hand--they will all come, they will all rescue him-- and then Ekundayo will be saved.

            The ship is damp. It stinks. It is very cramped.

            Ekundayo shivers in the dark. It has been days inside this hollow place, and still they have not set sail. At least, he thinks it has been days. Certainly months, since he was first taken. He had walked with the others for so long, and now he huddles in the damp darkness with strangers, barely able to move.

           One of the women had been travelling with the Oyo traders for a long time, ever since she had been sold to them from a previous owner. She had helped Ekundayo up when he had fallen in a puddle, early on in their journey. Her name is Jaiye, and she had come from a tiny village that Ekundayo had never heard of. It was far from Oyo-Ile. It was nothing that he should have concerned himself with. Oyo traders had raided this tiny village in the middle of the night, taking Jaiye and one of her children, along with some elders and warriors. They had sold Jaiye to a government official in another, much larger village, who had needed his farm tended to. She had been on that farm for about a year before being sold to the slave traders who had taken Ekundayo, and sent on another long journey. According to snatches of overheard conversation, the ones who had taken Ekundayo are old friends who had wanted more cowries than what the marketplace had given them. Ekundayo refuses to learn their names.

         For months, the Oyo traders march them all along at a steady pace. Even when an old man named Poroyo collapses, they do not stop. Poroyo had been a powerful war chief in his youth, and  he  would not let anyone forget that fact. During the journey he had cursed everyone’s names, and their father’s names, and their father’s father’s names. Ekundayo had grown tired of his constant tirades, hissed under his breath until he was whipped into jaw-clenched silence. He would scream curses, and everyone would pay the price: No food or water for the rest of the day, or worse, and Poroyo would smile and smile, even with blood staining his teeth. He was convinced that his wives and his sons and his sons’ children would come for him, that he only needed to steal a horse, and then he would kill them all. Jaiye had laughed and laughed, wheezing, “This is better than a good smoke. Well. Almost better.”

       They were all angry at the slave traders, of course. They hated them as much as Poroyo did. But the Oyo traders had guns, and whips, and food, and it was difficult to solely hate the powerful when it was easier to hate a mad elder with matted hair who should know better, an elder who treated his fellow captives and the slave traders as one and the same.

        No one helped him, when he had fallen. The slave traders had left him behind without a second glance. It is likely that Poroyo lies there still. Ekundayo tries not to think about it, but sometimes, he dreams and sees the elder’s murky eyes blinking back at him, veined hand outstretched, demanding aid and vengeance in a keening voice as a storm swallows the world.

        Jaiye hasn’t seen her daughter, Deji, in so long, not since the girl was sold to other merchants with the other village children. She was so young-- she didn’t even have her tribal scars. Deji had been frail, and deemed not ready.

       “Deji cries whenever she so much as scrapes her knee. She forgets to wash.” Jaiye says this one night, staring at the twinkling stars. “My girl is so foolish. A fool marked by nothing. She belongs nowhere.” The stars reflect their light in her eyes. “Not even with me.”  

       Jaiye doesn’t know where she is, where any of her family is. If they are even looking for them still. If they have had a burial. If they pray to them like they pray to the ancestors. Jaiye laughs when she tells Ekundayo this, one damp and dripping dawn, while they wait for the traders to come back from fetching supplies. Ekundayo reaches out, and their shackles clink together as he takes her calloused hand, and wipes her tears.

       Ekundayo doesn’t know where Jaiye is now. They had been sold to different buyers, before he’d been crowded into the ship.

       She had looked at him one last time with her good eye, the one that had not been burned during an insurrection on the farm. “Find it, if you can,” she had whispered, her breath hot against his ear. “Find a way out. I will.” And then she had been dragged away with a few other men and women, off to wealthy Oyo farms near the coast, at least according to the slave traders’ gossip as they had smiled and collected their cowries.

      Jaiye had hated working on that government official’s farm, cooking meals for a wealthy, lazy man who had dared called her his. Ekundayo had seen the rage in her eyes, as she had been led away once more. Jaiye will not spare whoever owns her next. The next farmer will sip some palm wine Jaiye had made, and Jaiye will smile, and he will not wake up. Ekundayo tells himself this as Jaiye disappears in a cart with the others. She will find her daughter. They will find their family, and live together in peace. It is not a good story, but Ekundayo tells it to himself anyway. At least Jaiye is not chained in the ship. At least she is not grabbed and prodded and surrounded by dying strangers.

     Ekundayo tries not to feel jealous.

    Jaiye will escape from the next farm. She will burn the farm to ash, and she will be free. She will. She has to. She had promised him.

    Ekundayo drops the lock of hair Jaiye had given him before he enters the ship, before he is stripped of what little clothes and possessions he has left. The lock of hair is falls into the ocean. He hopes Jaiye will forgive him. Ekundayo watches her hair sink into the depths of the sea, down, down below to Olokun’s outstretched hand, before he is jostled further onto the boat.

   He shakes his head. It’s alright. He will die soon.

   The abiku will leave him. It has never wanted to be trapped. It doesn’t like to be trapped. It will leave, and he will float above this place. His legs and his wrists will never ache again. His stomach will never be empty again. His lips, never cracked and parched. His head, never aching. He will travel back to the spirit world. It’s where he has always belonged. He wants to dream of the bush. He wants Esu to claim him as one of his trickster children. An orisha’s child is never alone.

    It is awfully hot. Ekundayo still shivers. He is shivering, shivering, shivering. A boy in front of him vomits when the ship rocks slightly in the port. The stench hits Ekundayo’s nostrils immediately. The vomit mixes with the seawater, and the sweat, and the dirt, and the blood, and the shit.

    Another boy cries a song in a language he does not know. They are all together, the young boys. According to another Oyo boy named Gege, the foreigners want them all in one place, for now, while they get more supplies from the shore. Gege knows more of the strange mens’ language than any of the others-- his slave traders had forced him to learn some of their words and sayings on the way to the ship. The other boys listen to Gege, even though he is one of the youngest among them.

      Ekundayo feels stupid-- he is not a little boy, he is almost a man, and eight-year-old Gege from some nowhere village knows more than he does. Ekundayo sighs: there is nothing to be done now. His slave traders had shoved him in with the children, and the foreigners had not looked at him twice. Ekundayo supposes that he looks younger than he is. He has always been thin and small, but now he must look even thinner and smaller.

       Water hits the tip of his nose again. There is a leak just above him. The water always finds its singular mark.

       Drip.

       Drip.

       Drip.

        Ekundayo squeezes his eyes shut.

        It’s alright. He will die soon.

Two

            The ship sets sail, after the storm passes, though it remains close to the coastline. There are more supplies to be fetched. More people to put in chains.

            The vomiting boy isn’t moving. He is taken away. The singing boy thrashes in his sleep, and the shackles cut his wrists.

            They all get some pieces of bread, some water.

            It is shoved down Ekundayo’s throat, when he refuses to eat or drink.

            He coughs and coughs, and hopes that he will choke.

            Gege tells him, “They said that we will not stay here.” He smiles. “They said that we can see the ship.”

            Drip.

            Drip.

            Drip.

            Ekundayo blinks as the drops of water hit his nose. He stares at Gege. He wants to tear that smile off of his face. He wants to swallow it whole, and spit it back up again. He wants to hurl himself at this child who smiles in a place the orishas have abandoned, and make him see, make him red--

            Abeni had always joked that he would never be a soldier, that he liked the quiet too much. Ekundayo had always been too gentle. Once, on a bright, cloudless day, he had found a baby bird injured in the marketplace. It had been all alone, and he had taken it home, and cared for it until it could fly away. The bird was small and brown, not fresh out of its egg but not fully grown either. He would run his finger lightly, so lightly, over its tiny feathers. The bird had hopped onto his shoulder once, and had dozed there for a time, nestled in the crook of his neck. Ekundayo had smiled slowly, so as not to disturb it. After he had set it free, Ekundayo had cried when it didn’t return the next day, much to his family’s amusement.  

            Drip.

            Drip.

            Drip.

            He looks at Gege. “I don’t want to see any of it.”

            Gege’s smile fades from his face.

            One has to count even small victories, in a place like this.

            It’s enough.

Three

            Unlike the girls and women and elders and men in chains, the boys are allowed to wander the ship. No one really knows why. Even Gege can only guess.

            Ekundayo walks, but it is difficult. For one thing, he doesn’t want to do anything at all. For another, walking is painful. The boys may be allowed to move, but that doesn’t mean that they are fed good meals, or given enough water, or that their wounds from the shackles are tended to.

            One of the foreigners-- one of their captors--looks at them and smiles. “Hallo, kleintjes.”

            Gege whispers, “That means hello. And something else, I think.”

            He waves, and the captor waves back. He is a big, horribly bearded man, with a sailor’s toiling arms, and a soldier’s precise hands.

            Ekundayo does not wave, and he walks to the railing of the ship instead. The sun is hot and bright on his back. The cuts on his wrists and ankles sting.

           Land is in sight, but Ekundayo looks into the sea. Maybe...maybe he could--

           He feels a tap on his shoulder.

           The singing boy mumbles, “Uxolo,” and Ekundayo doesn’t understand a word of it, but the tone is sad and the shrug is apologetic.

           The singing boy leads him back to where the others are, and that’s when Ekundayo notices that the big, bearded white man had been watching him. That his hand had gripped his gun.

           Ekundayo doesn’t look away from him, not until the white man looks away first.

           “Let’s go,” he says to Gege and the singing boy, and they follow him. The white man’s face is red and scabby from the sun, his yellow beard is shaggy and wild, and his eyes are as gray as the sky on the day that Ekundayo was taken.

          Ekundayo tells Gege and the singing boy, “He is too ugly to look at for long,” and they laugh, even though the singing boy doesn’t know what he’s said. It takes Ekundayo a moment to realize that he is laughing, too.

Four

            Some days, Ekundayo goes to the girls, then the women, then the elders, then the men, all in their separate holdings, all chained. The women and girls are allowed some more movement, but they are still confined, and many of them flinch and curse under their breaths whenever a white man glances their way.

Gege wanders like a child, aimless and full of his own whims. The singing boy often keeps to himself, and tends to stay with other boys who speak his language, and have his same tribal scars. It falls to Ekundayo, and the other older boys, to deliver messages between the girls, men, women, and elders, along with those who aren’t men or women, but who were shoved in with them anyway. Ekundayo isn’t bothered by it--there is not much else for him to do aboard the ship, as it travels from port to port along the coast. It becomes routine: wake up, listen to Gege chatter away, look over the ship’s railing, stare at the land just out of reach, deliver messages. Messages pass from voice to voice. It is a comforting sort of voyage.

            Not all of the people in chains are grateful--some former nobles are incensed at relying on a boy, and some are too ill to respond, but Ekundayo doesn’t care. Nothing bothers him anymore.

            Being a messenger gives him something to do with his hands besides curl them into fists. He delivers declarations between lovers, inside jokes between childhood friends, promises and prayers between the dying and the well, family stories between grandparents and their grandchildren, threats between enemies from different nations, news between newly-found friends aboard the ship. Many of the people in chains don’t speak Yoruba, but Ekundayo sees their pleading eyes, hears the choked tears in their raspy voices, and he listens to whatever translator can help him.

            “You are not a child,” one of the women tells Ekundayo, when he is about to leave them once more. He often doesn’t talk to them unless he’s repeating a message back to them. Usually he just hides in the darkness and listens. Their voices remind him of his iya, and his sisters, and he tries not to cry. He hasn’t cried in so long. It shouldn’t be difficult to keep tears at bay. And yet…

           “You’re nearly a man,” the Oyo woman whispers again.

            Ekundayo squints in the faint light. “Yes.”

            Her dark eyes gleam. She is tall, even when crouched, and there is a mole on her cheek. Her nose is broad and crooked, and her ears have little holes. She used to wear many earrings. She used to own a lot of finery. The woman smiles demurely at him, like she is discussing the latest gossip. “Tell my sister...hm. Tell her to prepare. To eat what is given to her, and to look very carefully at her surroundings. Her name is Atanda, she’ll be with the girls.”

          Ekundayo nods, and repeats the message back to her.

          The woman’s eyes glint in approval. “Tell Atanda that Idijola sent you.”

          “Yes.”

          "Thank you.”

         She inclines her head to him, as if he is someone great. Ekundayo nods back, and leaves quickly. He extinguishes the slight smile flickering across his face.  

         Ekundayo focuses on sneaking past many disgruntled-sounding, agitated white men speaking in low, sullen voices, as if they have any reason to grieve, as if they have suffered something terrible. He almost laughs at them, just to see what would happen, but Ekundayo had promised Idijola that he would deliver her little message, so he ducks and keeps his head low, and prays to Esu.

         Ekundayo almost slips on some foul-smelling liquid, and he has to hide away when the blonde, bearded white man from some time ago chortles away from where the girls are kept, clutching his sides as though he has told the best joke. Ekundayo imagines stuffing the man’s dreadful beard down his throat as he saunters off, boots heavy and loud in the echoing bowels of the ship.

         Ekundayo waits, and waits, and waits, and then, when the white man’s footfalls have faded, he slips in to where the girls are being held.

         Some shrink away from him. Some say hello. Others cry, or stay silent, or reach a hand out, demanding that he deliver their own messages, or to tell them about the goings-on throughout the ship. Some of them scream curses. Some of them try to muffle their sobs. Some of them are trying to play a game with each other, clapping and clinking their shackles together. Some of them are singing, which could be sad or angry or happy or all of it at once.

         In the din, Atanda looks up at him after Ekundayo has found her, and after he finishes telling her Idijola’s message. Her eyebrows raise. “You know what this means?”

         Ekundayo shakes his head.

         Atanda coughs, then grins, her skeletal face alight with excitement. “My sister is planning a revolt.”

Five

            Ekundayo should be excited at the prospect of a rebellion, but all he wants to do is sleep. Instead of sleeping for many, many years like he wants, he delivers message after message after message for so many people in chains.

            The ones spoken in Yoruba, and the ones spoken in languages he can now partially understand, usually amount to similar things:

            “Get weapons. Find out how to break the chains around our necks.”

            “Smile at every white man. Keep your hate secret.”

            “Remember when we thought we’d be clever, and we wore masks that we made ourselves-- you know, the horribly-shaped, clumsily-carved ones--and they were so terrible to look at that they frightened away that smelly dog that ate your baba’s goat? Soon, we will be much more frightening, and we won’t even need masks.”

            “Be the warrior you have always been.”

            “Be safe.”

            “We will find your baba and iya, and we will return to them soon. An elder’s promise.”

            “I love you.”

            “I’ve always hated you. Don’t die.”

            “Be ready.”

            “When the sun is at its highest, when their eyes squint at the light, and it shines through the holes of the ceilings. Then we will strike.”

Some of the messages are details and dimensions of the ship, and the exact location of where each group is being held. Some of the messages are in code, others an estimate of how many white men there are on the ship, what kind of weapons they have, and where groups of them are at any given time.

            It has been some time since they have all been forced onto the ship, and still, it lurches from port to port, gathering more and more supplies along the coastline. There is still time to tell the newly-arrived captives the plan. There is still time to strategize, to negotiate between members of rival tribes and empires, to execute, and to go home.

           The night before the rebellion, after the women have been tossed their meager bits of food and sips of water, Idijola whispers, “Take this.”

           Ekundayo reaches forward, and she presses something sharp into his palm. After squinting in the faint light, Ekundayo guesses that it’s some sort of tiny needle.

           Idijola smirks. “After the fool had slipped and fallen, he’d tried to sew on his lost button with that needle from his pocket. He ended up dropping the needle, too, the clumsy oaf.” Her face turns more serious, and her voice lowers. “Use it, when the time comes.”

          Ekundayo curls his fist around the tiny needle. He swallows.

         “Thank you.”

         His voice is cracked and hoarse.

         Idijola frowns. “Get some rest.”

         Folami had used to look at him like that, in that fond and exasperated way.

         Ekundayo ducks his head, and leaves without another word. He wipes his face in a tucked-away corner, and tries not to think of anything at all.

         In his dreams, Enitan whispers something to him, but he can’t hear her. He wakes up with his ear pressed against the hard wooden floor. Ekundayo wants to ask his iya what she’d told him, but he’s alone, curled underneath the cot of some drunken sailor snoring away.

        Ekundayo feels the needle still clenched in his hand. If he looks, he can see where it had pricked him in his sleep. He stares at the cot above him, and imagines that Enitan is there instead, that she had told him to go back to sleep. It is not a good story--it isn’t real, but Ekundayo tells it to himself anyway.

        When Ekundayo wakes, he slips away before the white man notices, before anyone notices, and goes where no one can find him. Not until he wants them to. Not until the sun is highest in the sky. Not until everyone is ready, and his needle can be put to use.  

Six

            In the humid, heavy dawn, as the white men call to each other and lumber about the ship, Gege mumbles, “Some of them like me.”

            Ekundayo raises an eyebrow.

            “It’s not-- I don’t want them to. But...some of them tell me that I am like their own little boys across the sea, except…” Gege picks at his bitten nails, and trails off. “I don’t want them all to die. What if some of them can help us?”

            Ekundayo almost laughs. “They think you are a little plaything. Not a boy at all. A rag to be tossed about, that’s what you are to them.”

            Gege nods, something like a smile twitching across his face. “Stupid to think otherwise.”

            Ekundayo shoves him lightly, like Abeni used to do. “Yes.”

            Gege bats his elbow away. “It’s just…” He bites his lip. “I’m tired of guessing what they mean. I don’t want to run from their hands anymore. I don’t want them to call me their boy anymore, not even the ones who smile as they say it.” Gege binks hard. “I want to go home.”

            Ekundayo swallows. He wants to reach out, and put his hand on his bony, fragile shoulder. Instead, he tells Gege, “Keep yourself hidden, when the time comes, and maybe…” Ekundayo takes a breath. “Maybe we will go home.”

            Gege shakes his head, and wipes his eyes. “You don’t need to say that.”

            Ekundayo sighs. “Sorry.”

            “It’s alright.” Gege draws his knees up to his chest, and leans against the crate they’re hiding behind.

            Ekundayo clears his throat. “Once,” he whispers, “there were two friends, who vowed their loyalty to each other forever.”

            Gege glances up at him.

            “These two friends did not see Esu, who had heard them make their oath, and felt jealousy rip through his chest. Esu vowed to make trouble for them, and so he schemed and schemed…”

            A slow smile slips across Gege’s face, and slowly, slowly, his eyes drift shut.

Seven

            The women and girls are brought out to exercise on the ship. The men will be next. The sun climbs higher, and higher, and higher in the sky, and then-- then it reaches its peak.

            Ekundayo waits. He stands still. He looks, and looks, and then-- yes-- Idijola nods to him, and he goes down, down, down through the ship, to tell the men and the elders that everything will begin now.

            “Waar ga je naartoe?” a white man laughs as Ekundayo brushes past him on the way to the men. The white man catches Ekundayo’s wrist, and raises an eyebrow.

            Ekundayo wants to scream, heart beating in his chest-- can he hear it?--but instead he bows his head, and tries to look afraid and bashful. He even produces a false tear.

            The white man stares at him for one long moment, then lets him go. “Goede jongen,” he whispers, breath hot in Ekundayo’s ear, and he has never been so glad that a revolt is going to take place as the white man walks away.

            When there is no one to stop him, Ekundayo bursts into the quarters where the men are working to free themselves, and shouts, “It’s time! It’s time!”

            One of the men, the one who has a scar on his chin and a haughty tilt to his head, yells back, “For freedom!” and then everyone is screaming-- their chants shake the entire ship, and Ekundayo helps the men distribute the knives Gege had found in a room where bags of supplies were kept, and he helps break the chains around the mens’ necks, wrists, and ankles.

            “It’s time!” he yells, his throat raw with sound. “It’s time!”

            There are footsteps and shouts surging towards them, but one of the Oyo men, wiry and rage-filled, beams. “Let them try.”

Eight

            Chaos consumes the ship.

            The ship is overrun.

            The ship is at their mercy.

            For a few moments, Ekundayo glimpses another future. He glimpses home.

            What he remembers most, about the revolt, is how fierce Idijola and Atanda are, strangling white men, cutting into them with whatever they could find. Two friends, Foluso and Uzoma, short and tall, fearless and terrified, shout curses in Yoruba and Igbo, and work together to shoot as many white men as possible.

            They have some guns, but the white men have more.

            The air rots with gunpowder and blood and the dead.  

            The blue, blue sky does not listen to anyone’s pleas.

            What Ekundayo remembers most, about the revolt, is Idijola grappling with a white man--the blonde, bearded one--and they wrestle to the edge of the ship. There is a long, long moment, before Ekundayo sees something flash in Idjola’s eyes, and then-- and then--

            She throws them both overboard.

            He will never forget the sound she makes as she crashes into the water, the sound other men, women, and elders make as they too hurl themselves into the ocean with whatever white man they can grab.

            He will never forget how she had held his hand in the dark.

            He will never forget the white man running after the blonde, bearded man, staring desperately into the depths of the sea, and how Ekundayo jumps him from behind, wrapping his legs around the man’s thick neck. He raises the weapon Idijola had given him, and Ekundayo stabs both of the man’s blue, blue eyes.

            The white man throws him off of him, clutching his face, and Ekundayo rolls away--he has to run, before it gets worse, before Atanda’s cries haunt his dreams--but then he is smacked so hard he falls, and the needle falls out of his hand.

            Ekundayo tastes blood in his mouth, and the whole world goes dark before he can glimpse any other future.

 

Nine

            They are all in chains, even the boys.

            Water hits Ekundayo’s forehead, now, from where he crouches with the others in the depths of the ship.

            Drip.

            Drip.

            Drip.

            He holds Gege’s hand while he cries.

            A boy around Ekundayo’s age smiles at him when someone sneezes in an impossibly high-pitched tone. Ekundayo tries to smile back, and the boy’s grin is a light that Ekundayo keeps tucked within himself, as the hours crawl by.

            Once, when one of the white men comes with bits of stale bread and a small jug of mucky water, he slips in someone’s vomit, or shit, or blood, or maybe all three, and falls on his ass, spilling the water and dropping the bread.  

            There is a moment of silence, and then Ekundayo can’t help it, none of them can help it: they all laugh, and Ekundayo has never smiled so wide, laughing with a dozen other ghosts.

            The next time the boys are allowed to wander the ship, kept on much stricter watch--when Ekundayo is even smaller and skinnier, when the cut on Ekundayo’s head has scabbed over, when the bruises all over his body ache slightly less, when the singing boy stops singing, and is taken away--there is no land in sight.

 

Ten

            Ekundayo tries not to remember the rest of the voyage. It is long stretches of cramped, stifling silence, fever, dazed and fitful dreaming, talking to Gege until he stops trembling, empty stomach, empty everything. He gets along with most of the boys, but one calls him weak and stupid once, because Ekundayo had spat out the “food” given to them. The boy does not call him anything now. Ekundayo finds him on the way to the cook’s cabin. The young, sulking cook lets some of the boys sleep there, sometimes, though he does it with a roll of his eyes, as though it is a massive inconvenience, or some sort of punishment. On this particular evening, Ekundayo does not sleep on the hard floor of the cook’s cabin. He bends down and closes the rude boy’s eyes, and gives him to the sea. He will not wait for a white man to do it. Afterwards, Ekundayo dreams of the boy shouting at him, and it might be in gratitude or in anger, he does not know. He wakes up sweating, and goes back to sleep.

             It is all very senseless, and very dull, and very pointless.

            One day, Atanda whispers, “I miss her.”

            “We all do.”

            So many of them had mourned Idijola with songs in different languages, with tears, with speeches. Ekundayo dreams of her crashing into Olokun’s waiting arms almost every night.

            Atanda nods. “When it’s done...when the ship arrives wherever it is headed, I’ll pretend. I’ll smile, like she told me to. But I’m going to run, as soon as I know where to go. They won’t touch me ever again. They won’t even dare to look.” Her voice shakes as she speaks. She wipes her eyes, and keeps crying anyway.

            Ekundayo stares at his hands, and wishes that he could be that brave. He wishes that he could cry like that. He wants to say something, but all he can do is swallow the lump in his throat, and look at her, and hope that she sees his meaning in his gaze.

            He puts a trembling hand on her shoulder.

            Eventually, Atanda wipes her eyes and her nose. She takes his hand. “Idijola would want us all to escape. Promise her. Promise her, and promise me, that you’ll be free one day.”

            “Of course.” Ekundayo bites his lip, a nervous habit he’d picked up from his iya. He thinks of Jaiye and her one, fierce eye, her last look to him, and how he hadn’t answered her, how he hadn’t said goodbye. He hears the murmur of the sea. “I promise.”

            He hopes that she believes him.

            Atanda nods, solemn and regal in the dark. “Good.”

Eleven

            Eventually, the ship stops at a port.

            A few of the white men--the healers--clean the girls, the women, the men, the boys, the people who are in-between or both or neither, and the elders. The deep cuts from their chains are treated with foul-smelling alcohol, and they are suddenly fed much more bread and watery soup than what they’ve been getting, and given more water (this time, not as foul) than they’ve ever gotten on this vessel. Their wounds are tended to. The dying are not left to decay for days, and are given to Olokun. The sick are given medicine. They are all presented with new cloths to cover themselves. It is almost decent.

           Ekundayo opens his mouth, and a healer feels his gums and prods his teeth and peers into the back of his throat. He resists the urge to bite the white man’s meaty finger, and stands still as every part of his body is meticulously inspected. The scab on his arm, the little scar on his elbow from a long-ago fight with Abeni, the purple bruise on his stick-thin calf, the calluses on his heels, the little hairs on his chest, the mole on the back of his neck, the round shape of his head, his broad nose, his big ears, his always-hungry mouth. Ekundayo tries not to feel embarrassed. He is almost a man, and he is so small and shrunken.

            The healer does not look him in the eye, not once.

            Ekundayo is slathered in oil, and he almost slips when he is shoved away.

            Gege flicks him with some excess oil later, when they are at the ship’s railing and watching the sunset. “We’re glowing. It’s like we’ve been carried by the sun to these shores.”

            Ekundayo flicks some oil back at him. “It’s so slippery. I feel like my body is dripping away from me.”

            Gege shrugs. “It’s not so bad.”

            Ekundayo looks at him. “Yes it is.”

            “No it’s not.”

            “It is!”

            “It’s not!”

            “It is!”

            “It’s not--!”

            “Shut up.”

            Ekundayo and Gege glare at the burly boy, Ropo, who always snaps at them to keep quiet.

            Gege whispers, “At least we’ve stopped. Maybe we’ll be on land.”

            Ekundayo curls his lip. “I don’t think that’s any better.”

            “Really?” Gege rolls his eyes. “You would rather be in the sea?”

            “I would rather be anywhere but here.”

            He doesn’t say, _I would rather be home_ , but he feels the ache deep, deep, deep in his chest.

            Gege sighs. “Yes. Obviously.”

            They don’t say anything for a while, until Ekundayo tells him, “They aren’t being kind, you know.”

            Gege laughs. “I know.”

            “Do you?”

            Gege raises an eyebrow. “Yes. Do you know that they want us to feel terrible?”

            Ekundayo rolls his eyes. “I don’t--”

            “You can’t let your mind be chained, too.”

            Ekundayo snorts. “Since when did you become so wise?”

            Gege grins. “You don’t want to know.” There is something in his eyes that makes Ekundayo close his mouth.

            They flick oil back and forth, until they are shoved away from the railing by a white man with a bristly patch of hair on his upper lip.

            Gege flicks oil at him before they go to sleep in the cook’s quarters, and says, “We’re brothers now.”          

            Ekundayo rolls over and looks at him. “What?”

            “It was just my baba and me, no one else. I’ve decided. You’re my brother.”

            “You can’t just decide--you aren’t one of my family, my family is-- my family--”

            Gege raises his hands. “Ok, ok, don’t get so mad.” He is quiet for so long that Ekundayo has thought that he has fallen asleep, but then: “I’m sorry.”

            It is barely a whisper.

            Ekundayo touches his shoulder. “I didn’t mean…” He counts his breaths. One, two, three, four. “All of my brothers were older. I’ve never had a younger one before.”

            He thinks he hears Gege sniffle.

            Ekundayo whispers back, “You can be my little brother.”

            In the pale blue dawn, before the cook wakes, Ekundayo opens his eyes and kisses the top of Gege’s head, like his baba used to do. He tries not to feel guilty, and tries not to feel warmth settle in his heart, and when that fails, he bites his lip and flicks oil onto Gege’s nose.

Twelve

            After some time, they are taken out of the ship and chained again. The sand burns Ekundayo’s feet, and he wants the ocean lapping at his toes to carry him away. The air makes his mouth dry. His hands are numb from the new shackles. Another group of white men force them to go deeper inland, into a bustling place that seems like a market.

            People call to each other in a mix of languages that Ekundayo doesn’t even try to understand. He does recognize the cadence of their voices, the pace of proceedings, the way a merchant’s eyes gleam when he is given payment.

            Right next to a small cart that sells bags of white bars that Ekundayo guesses are salt is a crowd of people, and they are looking at a large wooden stand. The white men make them stop walking, finally, and they shout and gesture at the wooden stand. Something in Ekundayo sinks.

            The crowd’s murmurs grow louder.

            The white men yell something to the crowd, making big gestures with their hands, grins wide on their faces, and the crowd nods and shuffles closer to the stand.

            In groups of three or four, they are marched on the wooden stand in chains.

            “What’s going on?” Ropo whispers behind Ekundayo, eyes wide. “Why is Rosiji up there? He’s my cousin--why aren’t I there, what are they doing--?”

            Ekundayo strains to look behind, but he whispers back, “I think...I think they are--”

            A white man calls in a loud voice, and strides up to the stand, squinting at Rosiji, and the old woman who has a wheezing laugh, and the man who has the haughty tilt to his head.

            Ropo stiffens behind him. “If they do anything--if they touch him, I’ll--”

            The white man prods Rosiji, and the old wheezing woman, and the haughty man, until he declares something, produces a hefty pouch of payment, and hands it over to the smiling white men who had forced them onto the stand.

            “No,” Ropo says, voice hoarse, “No, they can’t--Rosiji will beat them to bits--he wouldn’t leave with them--”

            Ekundayo pretends not to hear him.

            “Rosiji! Rosiji! Cousin, I will tear out their throats! I will find you, I will--Rosiji, do you hear? Rosiji?”

            Ekundayo stares straight ahead.

            After the wheezing old woman is bought, cursing them all with a voice that chills the bone, and the haughty man is hauled away as he fixes the crowd with a glare so powerful they quiet for a moment, the proceedings continue.

            Ekundayo thinks of how Bolanle hadn’t really been asleep, when he had sold their wares for the first time. She had pretended, and had let him practice on his own. Her snores had been too loud for them to be real.

            “Chima! Chima, be good! Promise me-- promise your sister you’ll be good!”

            “They won’t-- they can’t, they can’t do it, not to Idowu--”

            “You will all die painfully, slowly; no orisha will spare you, not one--you are already rotting--I curse you all in the name of--”

            “Ige!” a man calls, and something in Ekundayo cracks. It is not the Ige he knows--this girl is younger, and so quiet, but still, Ekundayo freezes.

            “Ige, my daughter, my girl, I will save you--my girl, my girl, I love you, I won’t let them take you-- Ige, where are you going--do you see her? Do you see my daughter? Tell me, please, where she is going, I can’t-- my eyes are weak-- do you see her? Please, please tell me--”

            Atanda beams when she is shoved onto the stand with Ige and an older man. She bows low when a white woman comes forward with her white husband. They smile back and take her away. Atanda doesn’t stop grinning. Everyone explodes into sound as she steps off the stand.

            “Sister of Idijola, we are with you!”

            “Smile and smite them later!”

            “Run when you can, find us when you can!”

            “Little warrior, you will fight them until the end!”

            “We are with you! All of us, we are all with you!”

            Atanda looks back, just once, and her smile doesn’t drop, but Ekundayo sees her fear and her rage and her pain before she turns back.

            Ekundayo looks at the ground. Nothing stops. No one stops.

            Abeni has the most annoying habit of chewing with her mouth open. Whenever Folami is sick, she forces everyone to prepare for her death, no matter how minor the illness. Enitan clutches him too close. Olufemi snores too loud. Monifa and Bolanle hate him, of course--

          “We’ll find each other, my love, we will always find each other--”

          Monifa makes the best okra soup because she uses the most spices, and sometimes she serves him an extra helping, even as his mouth burns. Bolanle is quiet, and lets him be quiet, too. Olufemi laughs with his whole belly. Abeni teaches him how to punch. Folami is an expert craftsmen, and the idols that she carves are better than anything the family sells. Enitan tells the best stories, and she loves him, and--

        “Lanre, remember the masks we’d made? The ones that scared away the dog? Lanre, do you remember? Make them afraid--make them run--Lanre, do you hear? Do you remember-- ?”

        Ekundayo feels himself walk up the steps. His hands are numb. His feet plod against the wood. Rodo is right behind him, still calling Rosiji’s name.

        Ekundayo doesn’t look at the crowd. He looks at the blue, blue sky.

        Hands touch him. Ekundayo floats above himself. Abeni would say that he has knobbly knees. Folami always tugs at his ears. Olufemi would be so proud of his chest hairs. Monifa would say that he is too skinny, that he should eat more. Bolanle would tsk at his slim shoulders. Enitan--she would take him in her arms, and carry him far, far away from this place.

       Eyes prick at him like flies. Voices hum against his skin. Ekundayo floats higher. He is an abiku. He is rising out of this shell, and he will join Esu--he hears Esu, shouting his name--

       “Ekundayo!”

        Ekundayo blinks. That’s not Esu, that’s--

       “Brother, brother please, don’t let them--I won’t let them--”

        Gege’s voice pins him into his bones, makes him shake.

        He is taken off of the platform. He is being led away.

        “You’re my brother, and I’m going to save you. Please, look at me. I’m not going to leave you, not ever--”

        Ekundayo stumbles. Someone close by says something to him. He keeps walking.

       “My brother, my brother, my brother, please, please--”

        Ekundayo turns his head, just once.

        Gege is looking at him. Gege is straining against his chains.

       “Gege,” Ekundayo whispers, and he hopes Gege can hear, hopes that words are spilling out of his mouth, that he shakes the world. “Gege, little brother! I’ll--”

       A hand hits the side of his head, hard, and Ekundayo jerks his face forward, his cheek stinging. He walks.

       Someone is making a horrible noise.

       It takes Ekundayo a moment to realize that the sound is his. He is wailing. He drops to his knees. He is splitting the sky apart, and he doesn’t stop, and it is then that Ekundayo knows that he will keep his promises. That he will make his family proud. That he will be the kind of brother Gege has always wanted.

       He weeps. He is lifted up, roughly shoved along, and Ekundayo walks, but he is not listening to whatever the patchy white man is yelling into his ear. He is an abiku. He can travel wherever he deems fit. The world beyond this one is his. It is his, and the voice tearing his throat is his, and the tears running down his face are his, and the scars on his face are his.

       The neighboring merchant with the small cart of salt spills some small chunks of white blocks into the road. Ekundayo crushes the salt beneath his feet, and he does not wipe his face, and while his body continues  to walk, the abiku within him travels to a place that no one can reach.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The "hollow place" referenced in this part is from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Written by Himself. 
> 
> I've based the Dutch slave ship experience partially on the British slave ship experience (boys are separated from everyone else, etc.) and if that's incorrect, let me know.


	3. PART III: KINGSTON

PART III: KINGSTON

_ “But step in and stay _

_ For good. We know the knife scars _

_ Serrating down your back and front _

_ Like beak of the sword-fish, _

_ And both your ears, notched _

_ As a bondsman to this house, _

_ Are all relics of your first comings.” _

_ -Abiku, J.P. Clark _

One

            “What,” Lydia snaps. “You think you can sleep all day? You think you’re special? Get up. George is calling for you.”

            Ekundayo barely understands this. It’s only been a few weeks. He understands fragments of English--he’d just started grasping a handful of phrases from the white men on the ship, and now he’s in Kingston, Jamaica, where no one he’s met speaks like the ship-men.

            “Did you hear me, you poor sod? Get. Up.”

            Lydia doesn’t speak Yoruba. She was born in Kingston and bought in Kingston. She’s lived with the Smiths since she was a girl.  

            Ekundayo scrambles out of bed. “Bed” is a generous term for the sack stuffed with straw shoved into the corner of the cramped, decaying stables where the two skittish, knobbly horses are kept, but he calls it a bed anyway.

            “Boy!”

            Ekundayo rolls his eyes. He wants to say, “I’m not a boy,” and, “My name is Ekundayo,” and, “I can’t believe I’ve been purchased--purchased!--by a merchant who can’t even sell his own wares.” Instead, he answers back in his most cheerful voice, “Coming!”

            George Smith is the spindly, patchy man who had bought him from the auction block. He has wispy hair the color of old straw that makes you sneeze, and watery eyes drained of color. Smith is a terrible gambler and an even worse merchant, and he’d purchased Ekundayo with the last of his savings in the hopes that he would help him run his business, and that buying another slave would give him more clout with customers and rival, wealthier merchants. At least, that’s what Ekundayo’s gathered so far, based on the way Smith curses his empty coin purse and parades Ekundayo around the marketplace, and from what Lydia mutters to herself while she does her chores.

            Lydia runs the Smiths’ household, not his business. Though Ekundayo notices, after one of his first days scrubbing dishes from breakfast, that Lydia also keeps the family’s finances in order, and does her best to keep their spending in check with elaborate, thorough budgeting plans. He sees her record every item in the house, every bit of coin that the Smiths pass between their fingers. There is nothing she does not know about the family that owns her, from George’s awful spending habits to Alice’s constant threats of adultery and arson to Mary’s whining about her poor nerves.

            George Smith (Ekundayo never calls him “Mr. Smith,” though George demands that he does) is not a complete brute, but he is short-tempered. He assumes, from the first moment they meet, that because Ekundayo cannot speak English that his faculties are profoundly deficient, and yet Smith simultaneously expects Ekundayo to follow his every order with perfect ease and understanding. Ekundayo, to George, is both too stupid to work and smart enough to be lazy.

            “Boy, I’m gonna get the lash out one day,” Smith tells him, when Ekundayo asks again for him to repeat what he’d said. He says this often enough that Ekundayo understands it now, though he has yet to feel the lash.

            Ekundayo says one of the few English words he knows-- “Sorry”-- and bobs his head and does what he does best, which is be a better merchant than George Smith ever will be.

            He may not be fluent in English, but he’s caught on to enough of it to sell George’s sickly sweet alcohol, and an assortment of necklaces, and sugar shipped from a nearby plantation. He uses Bolanle’s confidence, Monifa’s smile, Enitan’s fast talking, and Olufemi’s booming laugh. He is as bold as Abeni and as precise as Folami, and Ekundayo brings in more profit than George Smith has in all his years of living in Kingston. Ekundayo is never proud of his work, just hates himself a little more: here he is, a slave to a man Olufemi would spit upon, and he hasn’t even tried to escape yet. What would his family think? What would Idijola think? What would Atanda think? What would Gege think--?

            Ekundayo takes a deep, shuddering breath. It does no good to trap himself in his imagination. There is work to be done. There is an escape to plan for.

Two

            A year passes. Lydia and Ekundayo prepare meals that they will never eat. They’re fed consistently, but it is watery soup and bread and not much else. Ekundayo finally grows taller, though he remains just as skinny. A hair sprouts out of his chin. He tries not to dream. Mary reads some book aloud every morning, afternoon, and evening, and stares hard at him, as though he’ll care enough to really listen. She seems to think that there is one God, and that he should believe this too. Ekundayo tries not to laugh. His escape plans become dizzyingly complex. Most days, he is too tired and overwhelmed to plan anything of consequence, and he imagines flying far above the world. He makes idle talk with other slaves in the marketplace, but he isn’t sure how to ask about freedom. His understanding of English improves slowly, but he still struggles to speak it. Sometimes, Ekundayo refuses to speak at all, and his back feels the shape of George Smith’s boot for days.

           The Smiths give each other gifts on some holiday or other, something to do with their God, and for once they all sit together, comfortable and content with each other. After Ekundayo and Lydia cook and clean up a large roasted pig--Ekundayo had retched, after he’d taken an axe to its squealing head, and Lydia had had to butcher it, rolling her eyes and her sleeves--they are given some leave.

            “It’s Christmas,” George Smith mumbles, voice rum-slurred. “Get the night off, do something fun, eh, boy?”

            It’s been a year. None of the Smiths have learned his name.

            Ekundayo decides to go to sleep.

            He wakes with the dawn. His body is sore from growing. His stomach is always a little empty. Ekundayo curses everything, and then he gets to work, and thinks of all of the different ways he could poison the Smiths as he spits straw out of his mouth.

            “You’re sleeping in Frank’s bed,” Lydia tells him one night, a year and a half since he was brought to the Smiths’ home, a year and a half since he’s been memorizing different routes in and out of the Smith household and the marketplace, and amounting it all to nothing.

            Ekundayo startles. “What?”

            “That was Frank’s.”

            Ekundayo keeps patting the straw bits into the sack so he doesn’t itch as he tries to sleep. “Who’s he?”

            Lydia glares at his hands, as though she’s his iya demanding that he clean up his things, as though she isn’t only slightly older than he is. Ekundayo keeps stuffing straw back into the sack until he’s done, and Lydia bites out, “Frank was here before I was. He helped Mr. Smith with everything, from combing his hair to fetching his supplies to managing his gambling debts to soothing quarrels between him and Alice. When I came…” Lydia pauses, and something in her pinched face softens, just slightly. She is always frowning, always moving. Ekundayo hasn’t seen her smile, not once. “When I got here, I didn’t know anything about anything. Cried all the time. The Smiths didn’t like that. Lots of shouting. Frank was old, too old to--well. To be my pa. But...he’d bend down low, even though it hurt, and he’d make me laugh. Taught me everything he knew, Frank did.” Lydia’s gaze narrows. “And now he’s gone, and you’re here.”

            Ekundayo nods. “I’m here.”

            “What are you, a parrot?”

            “No.” Ekundayo grits his teeth. His whole body aches. His feet are sore. All he wants to do is sleep, and not answer to anyone. “I’m just the poor sod who’s gotten an old man’s shit inheritance.”

            Lydia doesn’t speak to him for weeks. Ekundayo is almost glad.

            Days into Lydia’s cold silence, Ekundayo finds a note tucked away underneath the straw bed, when he shoos away a mouse trying to nestle under the straw. It’s folded so small that he hasn’t noticed it all this time, but he picks it up now. He can’t read it--why do these people obsess over paper and ink, easily burned and crushed, when voices carry, when ink symbols can’t speak?-- but it’s in a steady and smooth hand.

            “Frank?” the woman on the corner tells him while George Smith tries to barter with her owner, a big red-headed man called Knox. She speaks a bit of Yoruba, and Ekundayo feels something deeper than relief every time they exchange pleasantries in the marketplace. “He was old, but not too old. Always had a smile on his face, but it was the kind of smile that broke like glass across his face. He’d talk of the weather, little nonsense things like that.” The woman, squat and sturdy, casts her sharp gaze about the marketplace, and leans closer. “He loved that little girl...haven’t seen her in a while.”

            “Lydia?”

            “Oh, yes. His smile would change, when he talked about her. You could tell it was the kind he didn’t practice the night before. I think…” The woman’s voice drops to a whisper. “Last I saw him, Frank was nervous. Jumped when I said hello. I think he was planning something. Had this look in his eye. You’ll know it when you see it. He kept looking at the ships docked in the distance, at the ports.”

            Ekundayo nods, glaces at George and the woman’s redheaded owner. They’re still arguing. “Can you read this? I found it under Frank’s bed.”

            The woman raises her bushy eyebrows. “I could be killed if I’m caught with this.”

            “I know--”

            “No you don’t.” The woman shakes her head and adjusts her headwrap nervously. “You’re new. These people...they don’t speak their stories, not without writing them down first. And to read their stories...they never want any of us to do that.”

            Ekundayo sighs impatiently. “So how did you learn--?”

            The woman smacks his arm. “Did you hear a word I’ve said? If I’m caught with this, I’m a dead woman, or worse.”

            Ekundayo leans in. “It’s the last Lydia has of Frank. I think it’s important. Do you?”

            The woman eyes him. “You’re a fool.” After a long moment, she takes the note, and tucks it in the folds of her sweeping skirt.

            “Thank you…”

            The woman curls her lip. “My name is Shola.”

            Ekundayo inclines his head, as he would to his iya-nla. “Thank you, Shola. I’m--”

            Shola waves her hand. “I don’t care what you’re called.”

            He’s about to respond, but the redhead bellows out, “Susan!” and Shola leaves without a backwards glance. Smith jabs his finger in Ekundayo’s direction, and they leave too.

            Ekundayo almost wants to tell Lydia about the note, but then she makes him scrub the floors after dinner while she sneaks out for a quick smoke, so he doesn’t say a word.

            At night, the two horses are his only company. The names the Smiths have given them are ridiculous, so Ekundayo calls them Simisola and Jokotoye. His baba had had his old war horse, Kolade, and Ekundayo had often brushed her mane, and fed her, and ridden her gently on their land.

            Simisola and Jokotoye are brothers--they have the same gray, splotchy pelts and liquid brown eyes, and they don’t do much besides take Smith’s wares into the marketplace and eat in the stables. Ekundayo should know: he goes to sleep and wakes up smelling like hay and horse shit, much to the Smiths’ complaints, and Lydia’s upturned nose.

            Kolade had been alone, which was just as well, since she had been unmatched in fierceness and strength. Her pelt shone a glossy black, and Ekundayo would scratch her ears, and feel her powerful breaths, and stroke her pink-and-white nose.  

            “In battle,” Olufemi would say, gazing at her in awe, “she trampled countless soldiers beneath her. She was fearless. We would both return from war covered in blood and dirt, and she would want to ride out the next dawn, when I was still sore.” One afternoon, his baba had pressed his forehead against Kolade’s neck, and he murmured, “When I lost my arm, she stood over me until I could stand again. We had entered battle together, and we left it together.”

             Kolade was gentle in her old age, but everyone could sense her vibrancy. When Ekundayo took Wúrà to meet her, he had stroked her mane, and told him, “She’s a true warrior.”

            “Yes. To match my baba.”

             Wúrà had smiled softly as Kolade had closed her deep-dark eyes to doze. “Thank you.” He kissed Ekundayo’s cheek.

             Ekundayo had blushed and beamed and shoved him. “Of course.”

            Simisola snorts in his sleep, and Jokotoye sheds constantly, which makes Ekundayo sneeze. It would be easier if Ekundayo didn’t think of Kolade. It would be easier if he didn’t think of Wúrà and Olufemi and warm afternoons. Ekundayo thinks of them anyway. Maybe, if he remembers enough, he won’t wake up shaking, with wet eyes and an aching throat, and a mouth that tastes like the sea.

            The next time Ekundayo sees Shola in the marketplace, Smith is off “on important business,” which means that he is trying to settle another one of his gambling debts. Ekundayo sells beads and the sickly-sweet drink called rum and bags of sugar. He thinks of everyone who had hacked away at the sugar cane every time he smiles at a customer.

            “You.”

            Ekundayo squints against the sun. The air is so much damper in Kingston than it is in Oyo-Ile. It makes the light hazier.

            Shola jabs Smith’s cart with her foot. “I’ve read it.”

            Ekundayo pretends to show her some beads. “And?”

            Shola leans forward. “Are you listening?”

            Ekundayo holds a bead up to the shimmering light. “Yes.”

            “Frank wrote…this is what the letter says.” Shola takes a deep breath. “ _‘Dearest, I cannot stay. There is a ship waiting for me. In the morning, my friends and I are going. I wish you could come with us. I wish I did not have to leave you. But this is a dangerous voyage. My friends are bringing their families on board, and there is no room left. If you are angry, use it to plan. I will come back for you. I promise.’”_

Ekundayo bites his lip. “Thank you, Shola.”

            Shola shakes her head. “It’s been a year, you know, since he disappeared. We all thought he’d died of old age.”

            It occurs to Ekundayo, when he is leading Simisola and Jokotoye back to the house, Smith muttering under his breath in the back of the rickety carriage, that there would be no reason for the Smiths to tend to Frank’s bed for a year. To keep straw stuffed in the sack. To keep everything as it was.

            “I have a match right here,” Alice Smith says in her high, reedy voice, as she sips the last of her evening rum, and eats the thick, hearty stew that Lydia had made but will never eat herself. “I’m going to burn all of it--there won’t be anything left, and you’ll have to work for a change, and I’ll laugh, I’ll laugh and laugh--”

            “Shove it, you mouthy bitch--”

            “Don’t,” Mary groans. “Father, don’t be so loud. My head aches...I think I feel a fever coming on. Lydia, fetch my blankets--”

            It is quite a while before the Smiths are off to bed.

            Ekundayo and Lydia are stationed outside of Mary’s room for the night, in case she needs anything. She had requested both of them, “since I might need to be carried to the doctor’s, or heaven knows what.”

            Ekundayo sits across from Lydia. In the dark, he can’t see her face. She doesn’t speak a word.

            “Frank…” Ekundayo swallows. “I found a letter. Fank wrote--”

            “I know what it says.”

            Ekundayo startles. “What?”

            Lydia is silent for a long moment. And then: “You heard me. Don’t know why I haven’t burned it yet.”

            “So…” Ekundayo bites his lip. “So are you going to--?”

            “I’m not going anywhere.” Lydia’s voice is steel. “He said he’d come back.”

            “...But--”

            “Mary needs something. I heard her.”

            “Lydia--”

            “Stay here, she’ll only want me.”

            “I’m not--Frank said--”

            Lydia turns. “Why haven’t you run away yet?”

            “I--”

            “What’re you still doing here? Leave, if you want to.”

            Before Ekundayo can answer her, Lydia’s already shut the door behind her.

            His hands curl into fists. His nails bite into his palms. In the quiet, as he hears Lydia speak to Mary in a low voice, Ekundayo hears the ocean.

            _“You’re my brother now--”_

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

_“Promise me, and promise her--”_

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

_“She belongs nowhere--”_

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

_“Take this--”_

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Clink-clink-clink-clink-clink-clink-clink-_

“Wake up--hey, wake up--ow! Let go!”

            Ekundayo startles awake with his hand squeezing Lydia’s wrist.

            “Sorry.”

            Lydia’s eyes glint in the dark. He can hear the pinched frown in her voice. “Just...just light this bloody candle.”

            After a few failed attempts--Ekundayo’s fingers are clumsy, and he’s distracted by the salty taste in his mouth--the candle is lit. It’s a little stump of a thing.

            Lydia adjusts her skirts haphazardly, and she absently touches an old scar on her forehead. She’s always fidgeting with something or other.

            Ekundayo bites his lip. “Do...do you ever grow your hair long?”

            Lydia’s hand darts to her forehead again. “No.”

            “Why--?”

            Lydia laughs. “Why do you think?”

            Ekundayo shrugs. “One more thing to take care of?”

            It’s why he’s been cutting his own hair, when he has time to, though he misses tugging at his own tight curls.

            Lydia looks at him like he’s grown multiple heads. “Do you think the Smiths care about my hair? Do you think Alice or Mary or, God forbid, _George_ knows anything about my hair?”

            Ekundayo leans back against the wall. “How long have you been with them?”

            Lydia rolls her eyes. “I can’t remember my mum and pa, if that’s what you’re asking. Frank tried a few times, to help, but he didn’t know anything about girls before me.”

            “Have you--?”

            “Why’re you asking me about my hair?” Lydia squints at him. “What do you care? Barely speak a word to me this whole time, and suddenly you’re asking me all these bloody questions--”

            “I learned from my sisters,” Ekundayo says to his hands. “Abeni...she wore her hair in long braids. They flowed like a river down her back. Folami styled her hair like local priestesses, like Sango and Ogoun and Yemoja’s worshippers. It would take hours.”

            “I don’t care--”

            “I always wanted hair like theirs.” Ekundayo scratches his own head. “Sometimes, they let me help them. If you grow your hair, I could help you. You could have braids, or twists, or--”

            Lydia shakes her head. “What’re you on about? You sneak too much rum?”

            Ekundayo stares at the peeling ceiling. These people build houses out of wood. Stick-houses. How weak. He looks back at Lydia. “I’m not leaving. I’ve wanted to-- I have so many plans.” He smiles with all of his teeth. “But I’m staying right here. So, you know. I’ll have time. To help you with your hair, if you’d like.”

            Lydia stares at him, then laughs under her breath. “You’re a funny one.”

            “I am. So do you want my help or-- ?”

            Mary coughs long and hard in her room.

            Lydia and Ekundayo don’t speak for the rest of the night: they have another one of Mary’s illnesses to attend to.

            Right before he falls asleep with his back against Mary’s door, Ekundayo thinks that maybe he hasn’t left yet because he doesn’t deserve to.

            A few more months pass. Ekundayo talks to Shola in the marketplace about Frank, about the clumsiness of English, and about the weather. Alice actually does burn the tablecloth one stormy night, and George doesn’t come home for three rainy days in a row, so Ekundayo has to purchase another one with all of the strange, differently-shaped metal coins the Smiths have saved, which he supposes passes as a form of currency. When George finally does come home, he stinks of piss and rum. His pockets are empty, and Alice burns his coat and his shoes. Lydia and Ekundayo take turns fanning Mary as they sweat in the heavy heat. Simisola and Jokotoye are only getting older: they’re slower and slower as Ekundayo leads them into the marketplace. Their shit stinks, and his arms ache from shoveling it. In the market, Ekundayo makes the Smiths some profit, but to them he is just an object that sells other objects. On his worst days, Ekundayo is an object to himself, too, a shell that the abiku must escape from.

            Lydia’s hair grows quickly. Ekundayo tries to tell her how to braid it, when she keeps trying and cursing in frustration-- she won’t let anyone touch her head, but sometimes she listens to him.

            One damp morning, Mary has received another letter of rejection from another suitor, judging by the red puffiness around her eyes and Alice’s fretting. Lydia passes Mary an ever-ready handkerchief, and, sniffling, Mary comments that Lydia should cover her hair, that it’s distracting and painful to look at.

            Lydia gives her one long look. “Mary, dear, the distracting knots in your hair have been a pain to my eyes since I arrived here.”

            When Mary begins blubbering and is about to have another fit, Ekundayo fans her some more, and offers her more breakfast, and tells her that Lydia is only joking. It almost works: Lydia goes  without food or drink for the rest of the day, but she doesn’t get the lash. It’s almost a victory.

            Later that day, Mary has finally been mollified, and is deigning to call for Lydia to apply her makeup for a local dance. Lydia brushes past Ekundayo in the narrow hall, and has to avoid his broom. He’s finally taller than she is, though only just. She doesn’t look at him. “Gonna have to cut it again, aren’t I?”

             It’s not really a question. Ekundayo stops sweeping. “I don’t think so. I think you can keep growing it, provided you--”

            Lydia smiles. Her eyes stay the same. “I don’t care what you think.”

            “Lydia, I’m-- I’m sorry--”

            Lydia shoves past him. The next morning, her hair is gone.

            Ekundayo hasn’t slept well in so long. There is an ache in his chest that won’t ever go away, no matter how much he tries to sing to himself, to remember good days, to work until he can barely think. It’s been two years, and Ekundayo is friends with no one, family to no one. Whatever his family had wished for him at fifteen, selling a useless man’s wares, shoveling horse shit, and being able to see his ribs surely wasn’t what they had in mind.

           Lydia glares at the stables whenever Ekundayo heads off to bed. He doesn’t know where she goes when she is alone. The dreams get worse. Ekundayo ruins his lip. He shakes and shakes. He wishes he could answer them, his family and Jaiye and Idijola and Atanda and Gege. Nights at the Smiths grow endless, the more Alice and George argue until the sun peeks through the clouds, the more often George comes home stinking of rum with barely any coins left.

          On a hot, finally-sunny day, a man arrives in an enormous carriage at the door.

          George Smith claps the tall stranger on the back. “Thank God you’re here.”

         “My employer said you’d have everything prepared?”

         “Oh, yes,” George smiles, ushering him in. “Yes, of course. Boy!”

          Ekundayo glances at Lydia and puts down the broom he’d been sweeping with.

         George tugs him close. “This here,” he announces, “is a fine boy. A bit dumb, but he’s obedient as any, and he’s brought in a fine penny for us. Quiet, docile, discreet, perfect for the city.”

            The man, white and dark-haired, peers through Ekundayo, and pokes his feet and prods his arms. “Is he in decent condition?”

            Smith nods, patting Ekundayo’s back. “Couldn’t have taken care of my own son better.”

            Ekundayo tries not to laugh. He smiles instead, and looking at this dark-haired, freakishly pale man, he thinks he understands Shola when she’d said that Frank’s smile was like glass.

            The stranger gives him one more glance, nods as though he is appraising a fine piece of furniture, and tells Smith, “He’s received all of your correspondances, and trusts my judgement. I’ll bring this boy to him. He needs another one for his youngest.”

            Smith bobs his head. “Of course, of course. Happy to be doing business with an old friend.”

            The dark-haired man bows his head stiffly. “I’ll be sure to tell my employer.”

            “Yes, tell Bill that he’s got an old mate in George Smith.”

            “I shall.”

            Ekundayo watches the men exchange papers and money. He floats above everything. He’s been doing that more and more often--the abiku within him refuses to stay put. He prays to Esu to carry him away.

            It’s night, and Mary is ill again, and needs both of them to care for her.

            Lydia stares at him in the dark. The candle is barely flickering. “I s’pose you’ll be leaving after all.”

            Ekundayo shrugs. “I suppose.”

            Lydia touches her head. She hasn’t shaved it again. Her hair is growing, bit by bit, every day. “Why’re you so quiet?”

            He picks his nails. “I keep thinking of everyone I’ve left behind. I want to scream.”

            Lydia snorts. “Thought so.”

            “It’s not funny--”

            “You know what isn’t funny? I remembered mum and pa and my brother and sister, when I was taken here. I wasn’t brought here. I didn’t arrive. I was taken.” Lydia is breathing hard. She glares at the candle. “I’d cry and cry. I kept remembering. What good did that do me? I had Mary to take care of. I had--I have Frank. So I’ve forgotten.” Lydia wipes her eyes angrily. “I’ve forgotten them. I’ve forgotten bits of his letter, too. Said there wasn’t any room, that all of the families filled the ship up. Like I wasn’t family. Like I wasn’t all that he had.”  

            “...Lydia--”

            “The only reason I’m telling you this,” Lydia spits, “is because I won’t ever see you again. I’m going to leave, after you do. When Frank comes back, I’m going to leave.”

            Ekundayo nods. “Alright.”

            “Did you hear me, Ekundayo?” Lydia’s eyes shine in the faint light, and he startles at his name being spoken aloud. “I’m going.”

            “Yes.”

            “Have a fucking fantastic time, wherever you end up. I’m leaving and never looking back.”

            “Yes. When Frank comes back.”

            Lydia nods sharply. “When Frank comes back.”

            The candlelight flickers. Ekundayo wants to take her hand, just for a moment. They have matching bruises from scrubbing the floors. The same callouses from dusting, sewing, cooking, cleaning, mending, polishing, tending to the household. It’s strange, the intimacies you learn about a person you’re forced to work with: Lydia sticks her tongue out when there’s a particularly stubborn stain on a shirt, and she hums to herself in a horribly off-key voice, and her hands always fidget with something. She can’t sit still, and she touches the scar on her forehead when she’s tired. She is tall and large, and she prefers wearing George Smith’s old clothes to her own, when she can. Her round face is always pinched in concentration, and her voice is low and hoarse, and she is so fragile. So delicate. She lets spiders crawl on to her fingers, and she blows each one away with such care. Lydia holds herself like she has been dealt a blow, and is ready for the next one. She is always looking behind her. She had never wanted to forget. She has long eyelashes, and deep brown eyes, and her laugh is a secret sound that no one in this house except Frank has ever been privy to.

            Ekundayo doesn’t know Lydia, not really, but he wants to tell her that he tucks the straw into the sack every night. That he won’t forget her. That he will be free, someday.

            Ekundayo doesn’t take her hand. He whispers into the dimmed light, “I hope you leave soon.”

            Lydia looks at him. After a moment, she says, “I hope so too.” She sighs. “Don’t look back. When you leave your new place, don’t look back. Keep moving.”

            Ekundayo nods. “Yes.”

           “I’m going to check on Mary.”

            Lydia blows out the candle, so as not to wake her charge, and Ekundayo stands with her in the dark.

            He is taken the next afternoon. The dark-haired man’s name is James.

            “You’ll be serving my employer, now,” he tells him. “And what’s your name?”

            “Ekundayo.”

            “...Ah.”

            Ekundayo tries not to roll his eyes as the carriage jostles, and travels back to when Abeni and Folami and him would stay up late and discuss their dreams.

            “...apparently they knew each other from their old school days...Smith came from a wealthy family, though he was their youngest, had to strike out on his own, or so his letters said...you’ll be living in much better accommodations from now on, I must say, and you’ll be serving a family that is truly prestigious…”

           When will he finally go into the bush? He is already so lost. This body is weak and temporary. He wants to fly and dance with the other spirits.

          “...oh yes, you’ll have many duties, of course. I’ll speak slowly, so you may comprehend…”

          Is Folami a full-fledged priestess of Yemoja now? Does she pray for him? Do Abeni and Taiwo have any children? Has Abeni confessed her love to Kehinde yet? Do baba and iya have another child? Does Monifa still cackle whenever Bolanle makes a joke? Does Bolanle still fuss over her jewelry?  

          “...and that should be all, for an average day. I’ve written to tell them, by the way, that we are arriving imminently, so they’ll all be expecting you…”

          What do Abeni and Folami dream about now? When will Esu claim him? When will he be free?

          “...the Guthries are a fine family, I assure you...they know how to handle your sort, a very fine family indeed, with the proper skills and breeding....”

          It is a long journey to Boston.

          Ekundayo is out at sea again. He vomits and doesn’t apologize. He doesn’t say anything at all.

          While they are still being rocked in the waves, Ekundayo takes one of James’s sharpest quills, and steadily marks himself while the man snores and chatters on in his sleep. One vertical line on the underside of his wrist for each of his family, for Jaiye, for Idijola, for Atanda, for Gege, and for Shola and Lydia, too. He winces and bleeds, and keeps marking himself anyway. He won’t forget. He won’t forget his promises.

         It’s warm in Boston, but it’s not like Kingston or Oyo-Ile. Very cloudy and smelly. Very crowded. His feet ache. Ekundayo almost misses the cramped and shoddy Smith house. He almost misses the sunny market of Kingston, and Shola’s small talk, and Lydia’s pinched frown. He has to wipe his eyes. 

         Before James knocks at the door of the Guthrie estate, Ekundayo presses the marks under his wrist with his fingertips. He feels each raised, newly-forming scar. He won’t forget. They can take everything else from him, but they can’t take what he marks on himself.

         Someone answers the door. Ekundayo feels the last of his scars, and steps inside.

 


	4. PART IV: BOSTON

PART III: BOSTON

_“The mouth is the shield to protect oneself.”_

_\--Zulu Proverb_

One

           Ekundayo’s bed is a small thing, but it is no longer a sack stuffed with straw. Now, he sleeps under a thin blanket on a cramped cot across from Richard Guthrie’s bed, or right outside of his bedroom, depending on what Richard prefers.

           He is Richard Guthrie’s personal houseboy. The youngest Guthrie already has servants to tend to him, all of the Guthries do, but it seems that his parents thought it best to purchase someone just for him, someone his age who could teach him “responsibility, leadership, and fortitude.” The Guthries couldn't select just anyone from the Boston markets: they relied on recommendations from trusted friends, until George Smith's letters finally convinced them to pick their most excellent gift for their most precious boy. 

          “This is our gift to you,” the Guthries had told Richard, and they had pushed Ekundayo forward. Richard had set a slice of cake down, looked over at Ekundayo briefly, up and down, before breaking into a smile.  

          Ekundayo had smiled back. He ran his finger tips over the scars under his wrist, and he had showed all of his teeth as he pictured Richard Guthrie choking on the slice of cake.

          “What d’you think this means?” Richard asks one chilly Saturday morning, as Ekundayo buttons the boy’s jacket, the same dark green jacket he’d washed a coffee stain out of, ironed, and folded days before. The buttons gleam and wink at him as he begins this morning’s work.

          Ekundayo is quiet for a moment, concentrating on the buttons and on not slipping into Yoruba by mistake. His understanding of English has certainly improved, but the Guthries’ accents and phrases are different than the Smiths’, and the words themselves still stumble slowly out of him, like George Smith back from the pub. “What was that, sir?”

          Everyone in the Guthrie family has a portrait of themselves hanging throughout the spacious Boston home--William and Eunice, their elder son Albert, and little Richard, of course. The colors are deep and rich. Each figure is life-like and ethereal all at once, ghostly white and clothed in opulent layers of glittering finery. This is a house where Ekundayo is required to wear linen shirts and pants, a dark suit, and crisp cravets at dinner parties and important events. On those special occasions, which are more often than not, he is better-dressed than the average freeman bustling throughout the narrow Boston streets. Even in his plain, regular serving clothes, he is better-dressed than some of the people he sees passing by the Guthrie home on the cobblestone street.

             In this house, there is an immaculate library filled with books and treasures from faraway lands. Every one of the Guthries have coffee-stained teeth, and they all spoon heaps of sugar into their tea.

            In this house, Ekundayo must address little Richard, his age and height, as “sir.”

            “I’m just wondering,” Richard says as Ekundayo finishes buttoning his jacket, “what d’you suppose is the matter, right here?”

            He jabs a finger right under his chin.

            Ekundayo squints. “I believe…” He stifles a laugh. “Sir, I believe that that is a chin hair.”

            Richard straightens. “Really?”

            “Yes.” Ekundayo steps back, and opens the door. “I’ve had a few myself.”

            Richard rubs a hand under his chin as he steps out of his room. “I knew that. I knew that’s what it was.”

            “Of course. Sir.”

            Ekundayo laughs silently to himself as he heads to the kitchen to help prepare Richard’s breakfast. He can’t help it. It’s so funny: the only ones who had witnessed Ekundayo tugging on his first chin hair had been Simisola and Jokotoye.

            “How are you this fine morning, Dicky?” William Guthrie asks his second son as Ekundayo is handed a pot of tea by one of the servants to place on the table. “Did your present give you any trouble?”

            “No,” Richard--Dicky, to his parents--grumbles as a white servant pulls out a chair for him to sit in. “No, he’s quiet but competent enough.” Ekundayo pours William a cup of tea, then Eunice, then Richard. He imagines spilling the tea onto their laps, and smiles.

            “Good, good,” William nods brusquely, noting Ekundayo’s apparent gratitude. “Well, son, you’ll have plenty to do today. Wouldn’t want him disrupting you in your studies.”

            “Father,” Dicky almost whines as he sips his tea, “Could Mr. Peters please come tomorrow? I have the most awful headache--”

            Eunice tsks. “Dear, your excuses are all used up. You need tutoring.”

            “But--”

            “No arguing. Your brother excels at school. You want to be like him, studying at Oxford, yes? I thought so.” Eunice straightens in her chair, and that’s that.

            At least, that’s that for Eunice and William, who go about their business as usual. Ekundayo must listen (and pretend to listen) to every one of Richard’s complaints well past breakfast.

            “I’m not a dunce,” the almost transparently pale boy grumbles as he gets out his parchment and ink. “I’m no fool.”

            Ekundayo stares at the books lining the shelves of the library, and watches as every one of them burns in his mind’s eye. If only the abiku inside him could make his thoughts become real. “Of course, sir.”

            “Father and Mother think I need special assistance-- I’ll show them. I’ll show everyone.” Little Richard stabs his quill into the parchment until he tears a hole through.

            There is a knock on the large, ornately carved door to the library. A round, red-faced, harried man who is presumably Mr. Peters strides straight for Richard. “What’s this?” he asks through his thick mustache, eyeing the torn parchment. Ekundayo tries not to wince at the mustache: it’s like an insect is scuttling across the tutor’s mouth.

            “It’s the boy,” Richard blusters, waving his hand, and Ekundayo tries his best not to roll his eyes. He grits his teeth in silence instead. “My boy doesn’t understand, poor thing--I was trying to salvage the parchment he’d ruined.”

            Ekundayo’s jaw aches. _I am no one’s boy. Not anymore._

            “I see.” Mr. Peters’ blue eyes glare at Ekundayo’s hands now.

            Ekundayo swallows and bobs his head. His neck will surely be sore, later. “Sorry, sir,” he rattles off, “so sorry, so very sorry--”

            “That’s enough.” Mr. Peters rolls his eyes. “I hate it when they grovel, don’t you?”

            “Oh-- oh yes,” Richard laughs, high and cracked. “It’s pitiful.”

            “Loathsome.” Mr. Peters takes a seat in one of the cushioned, high-backed chairs, and sets down his heavy bag of books. “Now let’s get to learning, shall we?”

            “Oh, of course. Just-- one moment.” He turns to Ekundayo. “Boy, will you-- ?”

            “Boy, you’re dismissed.”

            Mr. Peters waves his hand at Ekundayo until he moves away, Richard casting him sullen glances until he closes the door behind him.

            Ekundayo sighs in relief against the door. In this house, one cherishes whatever scraps of solitude one can snatch with both hands.

            Another family has refused to learn his name, though this time they claim to be worldly and sophisticated.  

            He’ll have to deal with Richard’s blubbering later, but for now, Ekundayo can help the other slaves with their chores around the house. After walking quickly past the family portraits--they always make the hairs on the back of his neck tingle--he spots a lone girl polishing silver in the parlor. It’s hard not to notice her: she’s the first person this morning to meet his eyes, and she has patches of white skin on her face and neck.

            “How’s the young master doing today?” she asks before he says anything, dark eyes lighting up. “Still an oaf?”

            Ekundayo smiles back, and this time, looking at her, he feels settled into his body, and not like a shell. “He didn’t know he had a chin hair growing.”

            The girl laughs-- quietly, should the Guthries or top servants overhear--and polishes with a flourish. “No wonder he needs special tutoring.”

            “No wonder.”

            The girl eyes him as he works. “You’re new, yes? Haven’t seen you around much.”

            Ekundayo nods. “I arrived about three weeks ago.”

            “Why aren’t you with the rest of us then? In our quarters and such.”

            Ekundayo shrugs and stares at his murky reflection in the vase he’s been cleaning. “I was, um.” He polishes harder. “I was a gift. For Richard. I’m with him all the time.”

            “...Ah.”

            “Yes.”

            “Well,” the girl says, casting him a sidelong glance as she polishes with gusto, “I don’t envy you, that’s for certain. I’ve been here for, oh, about three years, and I can tell you that Richard is the spoiled baby of the family. They dote on him like a fattened pig.”

            Ekundayo grins. “Yes, they call him--”

            “Little Dicky, I know! Have you ever heard of such a ridiculous name?”

            “No,” Ekundayo laughs as he polishes, “no, I haven’t.”

            The girl grins at him, gap-toothed and delighted. It’s like glimpsing moonlight through the thick, rumbling, wild layers of cloud in the rainy season. He hasn’t seen someone smile at him like that in at least two years, not since-- he bites his lip. Now is not the time to think about his little brother. Ekundayo swallows, and concentrates on the warmth spreading from his fingers to his toes. He almost doesn’t hear when the girl leans forward and whispers, “My name is Nneka.”

            She has an accent that isn’t like the Guthries’ or the Smiths’, but it’s not like Ekundayo’s either--with that name, she’s probably Igbo. Ekundayo feels a little thrill: she may not be from Oyo, but she probably wasn’t born in Boston, either.

            “My name is Ekundayo,” he murmurs back, and she beams.

            “Nice to meet you, Ekundayo.”

            “Likewise, Nneka.”

            They polish in silence for a time-- Ekundayo marvels at how comfortable the quiet feels--until Nneka asks, “So why haven’t you asked about my face?”

            Ekundayo startles and almost drops his rag. “Oh. Well, um. My sister Folami had some white skin on her hands and arms. She said she had clouds on her arms and at her fingertips, because the white skin looked like feathery clouds on a warm day. At least, that’s what she told me.” Ekundayo shrugs and finishes polishing another plate. “We didn’t talk about it much. I must’ve asked about it, but I think my baba and iya said not to worry about it, that a priest had performed proper protective measures when she had been a baby.” A memory bursts through his mind: His sister, touching each and every white mark, singing to herself. “Folami prayed all the time, and she ignored everything else around her, and she was always whispering the most dramatic things under her breath. Predictions of death and everything, it was so irritating-- anyway. I was too annoyed by all of that to really think about the clouds on her hands and arms, so--” Ekundayo stares at his sweaty hands. He’s slipped into Yoruba and he hadn’t even noticed. He feels like he’s told a great and heavy secret. In slow English he mumbles, “So that’s why I have not asked.”

            A hand grasps his. Ekundayo flinches, and the hand grips his even tighter. “What--?”

            “Thank you,” Nneka whispers. She squeezes his hand. Someone is holding his hand. She’s choosing to hold his hand. Ekundayo stares at their entwined fingers wonderingly, and squeezes back.

            “I’ve had it most of my life,” Nneka says when she lets go of his hand. His fingers are still warm.

             Nneka gestures to her whole body. “It comes and goes, but it’s everywhere. Just means I can’t be in the sun for too long, my skin is sensitive to it. My nne and nna worried about it, and my brothers teased me, but I’m not cursed or anything. Almost didn’t get bought, you know, when I got here from the ship.” Nneka shrugs, like she’s talking about the weather. “The white people thought I was sick. So did some of the girls with me on the ship. They wouldn’t talk to me at all, not even when...well. Ended up at the Guthries because I’m very persuasive, and Eunice pitied me, wanted to do some charity. Said she was inspired by the Lord or some such nonsense.” She laughs and rolls her eyes. “Enough of that foolishness. What do you think of the portraits? Aren’t they just ghastly?”

            Ekundayo blinks, trying to keep up: now she’s grinning like she’s about to spread the most scandalous gossip in the marketplace. “Yes, the portraits, they’re...they frighten me.”

            “I know! I can’t imagine why the Guthries would ever think that it would be fashionable to look like skeletons, or ghosts, or--”

            “Or sour milk.”

            “Exactly.”

            Nneka’s grin widens, and Ekundayo smiles back.

            They’re close to halfway done with polishing. The morning light streams into the parlor, and a bird calls outside one of the wide windows. Ekundayo’s arms are sore, but as Nneka chatters on about the goings-on in the household, something in him lightens and floats. The abiku doesn’t try to escape-- he is not outside of his body, but he isn’t trapped within it, either.

            “Eunice has little meetings with her friends plenty of afternoons, and they drone on and on about the church and who so-and-so is marrying and the latest foods they’ve sworn never to eat again. Sometimes,” Nneka whispers loudly, “Eunice even talks with her friends about unmentionable things, like-- well, I’ll tell you when we have more time. She doesn’t even tell William about it, and they’re attached at the hip.”

            “Yes, the Guthries seem close. Not like…” Ekundayo almost makes a joke about the Smiths before remembering that Nneka doesn’t know who they are, that they’ve only just met. “Never mind.”

           Nneka chatters on, humming and talking and humming and talking. “...Oh yes, most of the servants are decent to us, and so are the other slaves, but don’t be surprised if the ones from around here ask you stupid questions, like if you’ve ever eaten human flesh, or if you ran around naked in the jungle.”

           Ekundayo chokes on his own spit. “I-- what? Human flesh? I’ve never been to a jungle--”

           Nneka waves her hand. “They’re ignorant, they don’t know much of anything outside of Boston.”

           Ekundayo thinks of Lydia and her stubborn Smith family accent, and nods slowly as Nneka talks on.

           “Timothy and Henry are two white servants who are the most obnoxious about those questions, just to warn you. You’ve met James, he’s alright as long as you can tune him out. Don’t get too testy with the servants, mind you, or you’ll be sold elsewhere. But not all of the servants are like that, and not all of the servants are white. Ruth, for instance..” Nneka smiles and...blushes? And coughs, just a bit. “Ruth is very sensible. So are Louisa and Oliver and Dot. And Penelope, she’s a slave who’s never left Boston, doesn’t know anything about which tribe her family’s from, but her mother must’ve raised her right, because she’s so sweet.”

           “Oh, well that’s nice.”

            Nneka talks and talks-- “Oh, and then there’s Obi and Lelise and the others from Africa. You’ll like them, probably, though Lelise can be a bit chatty--” and Ekundayo listens, trying to keep track of everyone’s names and mannerisms and stories. He’s never polished silver so fast.           

             “...But dinners are usually fun, at least, because Sifiso is there.”

            Ekundayo pauses, finally, and wipes his brow. “Sifiso?”

            Nneka gasps. “You haven’t met Sifiso?”

            “No? Should I have?”

            “Well,” Nneka leans in, “you’ll meet him soon--that’s right, he’s been at the docks with William working on some important task. Sifiso is...you’ll find out soon enough.” She stares hard at him, her eyes suddenly stern and solemn. “When you see him, don’t say anything about his looks.”

            “What--?”

            “Don’t stare, and just say hello. Or better yet, don’t talk at all. You understand?”

            Ekundayo nods, frowning under the force of her gaze. “Yes.”

            “Good. Sifiso acts tough, but if you say the wrong thing--”

            “Boy! Is that you?”

            Ekundayo startles, and Nneka falls silent. Richard is standing in the doorway.

            “Sir?” Ekundayo makes sure to bow his head.

            “I was looking for you everywhere-- Mr. Peters has gone, finally, and you have duties to attend to.”

            “Yes, sir.”

            Ekundayo rises, and sends Nneka an apologetic glance. She shakes her head and mouths, _‘I’ll see you later.’_

Ekundayo keeps her moonlight-grin tucked within himself as Richard leads him away, complaining about how Mr. Peters is too strict and how Ekundayo failed to clean his room properly and how he shouldn’t run off like that, how he should--

            The day passes. Ekundayo folds Richard’s clothes and sweeps his floor and makes his bed and picks up his stray books and cleans away the old wax from a long-ago melted candle on Richard’s nightstand and, after bracing himself, kills the spiders scuttling out from under his bed. As Ekundayo flicks a dead spider away from his feet, he thinks of the spider god his iya had told him about, the ones the Ashante worship. Ekundayo hears his mother’s voice, smooth and steady:

            “ _Anansi was not a spider now, but in the form of a man, with a great pot strapped on his back. ‘This,’ Anansi announced, ‘is all of the wisdom of the world, and it is mine.’ But as Anansi struggled to hide the pot up high in a tree, his son was watching him…”_

            Richard crows, “My room has never been so spotless,” and Ekundayo nearly jumps at the sound of his voice.

            He shakes his head, and the abiku pulls him out of the past. “Thank you, sir.”

            The boy absently brushes the remains of the afternoon’s tea-and-biscuits from his shirt, and Ekundayo watches as each crumbs falls onto the floor.  

            That night, Ekundayo and Nneka exchange looks when William and Eunice talk about if “we have too many servants,” and if “we should be stricter to them--are they spoiled, do you think?” amidst a larger discussion about how children aren’t being raised with the right amount of God’s discipline.

            “No Sifiso tonight,” Nneka tells him as they clean up the dinner with the other slaves and servants. “Pity. I could’ve used a laugh.”

            “Is he amusing?”

            Nneka frowns slightly as she dries a plate. “I suppose? It’s hard to describe.”

            “Why shouldn’t I say anything to him--?”

            “Oh, enough about Sifiso,” Nneka suddenly sighs, applying her rag to a heavy serving dish. “People talk enough about him.” She finishes drying the serving dish quickly, and Ekundayo continues washing the next one.

            “I’m sorry.”

            Nneka gently flicks his shoulder, and Ekundayo tries, again, not to think of Gege as she says, “Oh, no need to apologize-- are you alright?”

            Ekundayo scrubs away the leftover pie crust from the dish. He cleans and cleans. “...Yes.” He blinks until he can see his hands clearly again. “Where was your home, before?”

            Nneka brightens instantly. “Igbo-Ukwu. Do you know it? It’s in the heart of the kingdom of Nri. We were not as wealthy as our neighbors, but my nne and nna were the best sculptors and smiths in the capital, I swear to you.”

            “Wait,” Ekundayo frowns, “You’re Nri? We’d hear of them-- I’m from Oyo-Ile, the capital of Oyo--” and it feels so good to speak these words aloud. He squares his shoulders. “My family were merchants, and we’d hear talk of the Nri in the market. Do you really never fight?”

            Nneka raises her eyebrows. “Of course not. Wars are horrible, something you Oyo people never understood.”

            “Horrible?” Ekundayo stops washing the bowl he was holding, and a servant glares at his briefly idle hands. “At least we’re not cowards who hide behind our gods.”

            “Now listen--”          

            “Enough,” a man, another slave, snaps at them as he hands off a collection of forks and knives to Ekundayo. He is sturdy and stern, older than Ekundayo and Nneka but not an elder by any means. “If you want to sleep longer, you’ll work faster, and talk less.”

            “Obi,” Nneka protests, “I have to defend my people when I can.”

            “Defend them tomorrow, when you have time.”

            “Listen--”

            “The only sound I want to listen to is the sound of you cleaning.” Obi softens minutely. His sharp jawline relaxes. “I’m glad, at least, that there is someone else to listen to your prattling.”

            “We could use the break,” a woman whispers (yells, really) into Ekundayo’s ear as he starts cleaning the forks and knives.

            “You’re one to talk, Lelise,” Nneka snaps back, “going on and on about nothing--”

            Cleaning up dinner has never been so lively.

            When Ekundayo and Nneka are finished with the night’s work, weary and sore, stomachs mostly appeased with bread and slices of tough beef, Nneka turns to him.

            “You sleep in Richard’s room?”

            Ekundayo nods, feeling his face heat up. “Yes.”

            Nneka touches his shoulder instead of laughing at him and his duties. “I’m sorry. Some will say you’re favored, but that can’t be easy.” She grins. “He probably whines in his sleep.”

            Ekundayo stifles a laugh. William wakes at the slightest disturbance. “He does, actually.”

            “Wait, really?”

            “Well, not all of the time. But sometimes he makes noises when he dreams, and I wake up and can’t sleep.”

            Nneka shakes her head. “You’d best be off, before he throws a fit.”

            “Yes.”

            “About our argument--”

            Ekundayo stands tall, or as tall as he can be, which is thankfully taller than Nneka. “I stand by Oyo’s strength--”

            “Whenever we meet, you tell me something about Oyo-Ile, and I’ll tell you something about Igbo-Ukuwu. That way we can decide, later, who is right about which is the greater nation.”

            Ekundayo glimpses her smile in the dark. He reaches forward, and her hand is already outstretched, waiting for his. “Alright.” He doesn’t want to let go. “Goodnight, Nneka.”

            “Goodnight, Ekundayo.”

            He listens to Richard’s late-night ramblings about how he is going to be a bigger success than Albert, and goes to sleep with his hand still tingling.

            Ekundayo first dreams of home. He smells tsire-style beef, and his baba calls for him to brush Kolade’s mane, and his iya tuts and says he should eat more, he is so skinny, he is wasting away. When he wakes to Richard’s muttering sleep-talk, he curses the Guthries to ruin and wipes his eyes.

            In his second dream, when Ekundayo finally goes back to sleep, he is outside the Guthrie house. There is no cobblestone street, just long stretches of the bush in front of him. A strong wind blows, and a mysterious man approaches, carried on the wind. His face is obscured by his large cloak, but Ekundayo glimpses many scars, a furrowed brow, and a dark gaze. He startles awake in the soft dawn light, confused and disoriented, reaching for someone who isn’t there. It occurs to Ekundayo, as he hears servants and other slaves walk about the house and prepare for the day, that he wants to know what this day will hold. Nneka’s past, this mysterious Sifiso-- Ekundayo feels something he has not felt since he was in Oyo: Curiosity. Excitement. A yearning to learn more.

            _What’s next?_

And then, as he sets his feet on the floor: _What’s in the bush?_

Two

            In their gracious benevolence, the Guthries have given everyone in the household “a day of rest,” which is really only a few hours of doing less work than usual.

“It’s Sunday,” they say, as if that explains everything. Before going to church, Richard reads to Ekundayo from the same book Mary Smith had read from, and as usual Ekundayo doesn’t listen to a word of it.

            “Sifiso?” Obi asks when the man finishes his card game. “He’s decent. I don’t talk to him much-- you’ll see why-- but I suppose he’s alright enough.”

            “I heard,” Lelise whispers when Ekundayo pours her some wine she snuck from the cellars, “that Sifiso almost set the house on fire. If poor Jonathan hadn’t caught him, he would’ve killed us all. He’s mad, is what he is.”

            “He works with Guthrie at the docks,” a servant named Paul mentions when he’s done preparing afternoon tea just so. “Sifiso works here sometimes too, mostly depending on if there are guests over for dinner. He likes to put on a show.” Paul shakes his head and runs a hand through his frizzy, graying hair. “Never understood it myself, why he likes that so much.”

            “Sifiso is my friend,” Nneka tells him in a rare moment of respite, while the Guthries are out with friends from church. “Whatever anyone else says about him, I know that that’s true. He picks his nose, by the way, in case you think he’s some legend.”

            Ekundayo snorts. “I’ll be sure to remember that.”

            “So,” Nneka asks, “tell me something about Oyo-Ile. When was your first kill?”

            Ekundayo scoffs. “I never killed anybody. Baba was a soldier, though, and before he lost his arm he fought in many wars. He was almost one of the Eso, one of the great war chiefs on horseback, but he became a merchant instead, when his right arm left him. The market is always busy, but there are places to hide in and play, like between two abandoned carts, or near Lekan’s cart of yams, he has the worst breath.”

            Nneka nods and rubs her chin. “At least you weren’t drinking the blood of your enemies. Nri had a market too, though we didn’t go into it as often. The forge was always hot, and all of us were always sweaty. My nne and nna had the strongest, most skilled hands in the kingdom. I kept a little shining figure they made of bronze, a little goat. I carried it everywhere, named it Ebele.”

            Ekundayo determines that the Nri kingdom does not fight in any war, not one, and that it relies on its ndi Nri to spread the Nri’s faith and influence and territory. Nneka discovers that the Oyo were once brutally crushed by Nupe-- “excuse me, Tapa,”--warriors, and that it had taken them so long to gain their own freedom back.

            “Violence is inexcusable,” Nneka insists.

            “No one can stop every war,” Ekundayo argues. “War will always happen.”

            “Do you want my bread crusts? I hate them.”

            Upon mutual agreement, the debate will extend into the next day.

            Soon, it is evening. There are old church friends for dinner, but no Sifiso.

            This time, Ekundayo dreams that the cloaked, terribly scarred man with the furrowed brow is lighting a match in the cellars of the Guthrie house. The portraits don’t stop him. Ekundayo is not himself in this dream-- he is transcending his form, and he steps towards the bush before he is caught in the flames, hand outstretched. He startles awake coughing, and for a moment, he smells smoke.

 

Three

            “I hate school.” Richard shoves the fluffy white dog off of his lap, and glares at his feet. “You’re lucky. You don’t have to learn Latin or arithmatic or anything else.”  

            Ekundayo glances up from where he’s dusting the shelves of the library. “...Yes, sir.”

            “And you should hear the teachers! They say that I’m behind, and the other boys-- well, Thomas Bell and Gregory Pickett knock over their books and say that I’m the one who’s disrupting class, and Kenneth kicks the back of my desk, and Samuel Simons stuffs leaves down my trousers, and-- and--”

            There is a pause. Ekundayo inspects a little porcelain bird placed on one of the high shelves of books. Did he get the dust underneath it? He squints--yes, yes he had--

            There is a loud sniffling noise. Ekundayo places the porcelain bird back in its place gently, and cranes his neck around to see Richard wiping his nose.

            Ekundayo lets loose a tiny sigh, and slowly climbs down from the wooden ladder, placing the duster at the foot of it.

            He walks slowly towards the trembling Richard, as one would approach an injured elephant calf. Though, Ekundayo thinks, biting the inside of his cheek so he doesn’t laugh, he would much prefer approaching an elephant calf.

            “Sir?” he asks, when he is close enough to see that Richard is trying and failing not to cry. “Are you alright?”

            “I’m fine,” Richard mumbles. He wipes his eyes furiously. “You don’t understand-- the boys at school, they’re-- they’re merciless, and I’ve never done anything to provoke such-- such--”

            “I’m sure you haven’t.”

            Richard takes the handkerchief offered, and blows his nose loudly. Some of the snot lands on Ekundayo. He does his best to discreetly wipe it away.

            “Al always had loads of friends,” Richard tells him, voice thick, “but I-- I haven’t got one.”

            Ekundayo sits in front of him, because his feet are tired. “This will pass. You’ll find friends soon enough.”

            “How do you know that?” Richard demands, voice tinged with scorn. “You’ve never been to school-- you don’t even know--”

            “You’re right. Sir.” Ekundayo winces just saying it. “But I’ve been teased and chased.” _I am owned. I have not seen my family in three years._ “It is, ah, difficult now. But it won’t always be.” _You have this house to inherit, piles of wealth to spend, your family--_

Richard stops sniffling. “I suppose you’re right.”

            Ekundayo bobs his head. “Thank you, sir.”

            Richard straightens in his chair. “Well, you best be getting back to whatever you were doing.”

            _I was dusting, you idiot._

“Yes, sir.”

            Richard smiles at him before he opens his book for school. Ekundayo smiles back, but only just.

            It has been a long Sunday. Ekundayo hasn’t had a time to rest since he woke at dawn. Everything aches. He feels like an old man, the way he’s sore all over while Richard bounds about the house.

            While they prepare for a large dinner, Nneka tells him that in the Nri kingdom, peace is the most important law.

            Ekundayo whispers back, “If we had not fought in our wars, we would not be strong. We would not become who we were meant to be.”

            “Why become an empire at all?”

            “What?”

            Nneka expertly folds the napkins and doilies. “Why become an empire when that means you must kill other people for it?”

            Ekundayo scoffs. “Because-- because it’s our destiny! And the other kingdoms would have killed us first-- I don’t know how you Nri can even call yourselves a kingdom, you are so puny--”

            “We do not need to kill people for more land.” Nneka looks at him like he is an infant. “We change their hearts and minds. When they worship our orishas, when they respect peace, they become one of us, and so does their land.”

            “What about bad people in your little kingdom who need to be killed?” Ekundayo shoots back as he lays out the plates. “What then?”

            “Well, we--” Nneka stops and looks behind him. “Talk later, Obi’s coming.”

            Obi strides into the room, dressed so handsomely that Ekundayo feels his face warm despite himself. “You two.” Obi eyes them with his usual sternness. “Are you attending to your tasks?”

            “Yes.” Nneka gives the table one more glance before nodding. “Of course we have.”

            “Good,” Obi says, and a smile flickers across his face. “Sifiso is performing tonight, and I wouldn’t want you two to miss it.”

            Nneka gasps. “Sifiso is back? Where is he? How did you know--?”

            “I heard William mention it as I took care of his things from the docks.” Obi holds up a hand as soon as Nneka opens her mouth. “Sifiso is preparing right now. He wouldn’t want anyone to disturb him, I’m sure.”

            “Ugh, fine, I suppose that’s right.”

            “Of course.” Obi bends down, peering at the table. “And you there, be sure to adjust this plate right here, so everything aligns.”

            “Yes, Obi.”

            Obi nods curtly to Ekundayo. “Good.”

            “Sifiso is finally here!” Nneka whisper-yells as soon as Obi leaves. “Oh, I can’t wait, I simply can’t.”

            Ekundayo nods along, feeling curious and caught up in Nneka’s excitement.

            Dinner arrives swiftly and without issue. The Guthries’ guests for the evening, some important businessmen and their wives, enter the dining room to steaming piles of crab, buttery potatoes, and glasses of wine.

            The Guthries and their guests talk on and on about deals they wish to secure, items they’ve shipped, and other subjects too dull for Ekundayo to even pretend to listen to. The abiku dislodges from deep within him. The abiku is a gentle breeze for his sisters and brothers. He touches his iya’s hand. The spirit kisses his baba’s cheek. He tosses Kolade’s mane in a gust of dry wind. Ekundayo the abiku almost reaches the bush--he is outside of the market, outside of the capital, but then-- Richard nearly drops his head into his potatoes. Ekundayo startles and hurries over to him, tactfully bumping the boy’s chair until he lifts his head up.

            The hours crawl by. He does not leave his body behind again: apparently the abiku is bored, but not bored enough. The only thing that keeps Ekundayo awake are Nneka’s vibrating excitement and her running commentary on each and every one of the guests.

            “I think there’s something odd about these men,” Nneka whispers as they pass each other going to and from the kitchens. “They seem much wealthier than the average merchant at the docks, and yet they claim that that’s who they are.”

            “None of them are to be trusted,” Ekundayo shrugs.

            “Well obviously, but I just think it’s interesting how they seem to ship so many materials at night, when it would be more prudent to send their ships out during the day, so the materials could arrive faster.”

            “Hm.” Ekundayo takes the extra serving plate of crab. “That is strange.”

            “I’m tired too,” Nneka whispers, and Ekundayo blinks blearily at the bags under her eyes. “But I think we should pay attention to this. William always has strange men for business partners, but these people...they don’t hide it. We should be aware of them, that’s all. At least until Sifiso finally arrives.”

            “Alright.” Ekundayo almost drops the plate of crab-- he just wants to sleep-- before catching himself in time.

            He serves crab to everyone seated, and listens as they prattle on.

            “Of course, but the shipment must be timely; you know how they get sometimes. Our, ah, business partners can be quite stubborn.”

            William Guthrie claps his companion on the back, laughing long and loud. “You’re right about that one, Bell.”

            Eventually, the table’s tittering subsides, and Eunice motions for someone-- everyone?--to come to the table.

            “What’s going on--?”

           “We’re preparing for Sifiso,” Nneka says hurriedly. “Gather everything into the kitchen, we’ll clean it afterwards.”

            Servants and slaves bustle about, and Ekundayo hears bits of conversation--

            “Oh, yes, we have some entertainment planned for you tonight, should you wish to stay but a while longer--”

            “We would be delighted to stay-- this has been such a pleasant evening, thank you and your lovely wife--”

            New candles are lit. The table has been cleared. A hush falls over the table.

            William’s voice rings in the spacious room. “We have a special specimen here tonight. Prepare, ladies and gentlemen, to witness something extraordinary, something you have never laid eyes on before.” He looks at each of his guests. “Prepare your courage. This is not for the faint of heart.”

            Everyone looks suitably curious. One woman whispers something to her husband, who nods, looking anxiously about the dim room.

            Richard, though he’s had to have seen this all before, glances about until his eyes land on Ekundayo. He jerks his head.

            “Must you go to him?” Nneka sighs. “I wanted to introduce you and Sifiso properly, after it’s done.”

            Ekundayo sighs back. “Duty calls.”

            “We’ll talk tomorrow.”

            “Of course.”

            Ekundayo stands behind Richard’s chair. Richard nods his head just slightly, as though he feels secure now. Ekundayo tries not to roll his eyes.

            “Now,” William Guthrie intones, voice deepening, “it’s time for tonight’s entertainment. I present to you a spirit from deep within the jungles of Africa, a being so ferocious that some of the living have died merely upon beholding him. I traveled to these jungles to find this spirit, and after a great struggle, only I was able to trap him and bring him to civilization, where I have since trained him to be ghastly good fun. Oh,” William smiles, “here he comes now…”

            A low wail sounds from the parlor. The woman who had been talking with her husband jumps.

            The wail grows louder until it is a moan. Feet stomp towards the dining room. One of the men covers his ears. Everything just grows louder and louder, until the room is pierced by a scream--the hairs on Ekundayo’s arm stand up, and he wonders if the portraits have come to life--

            Someone enters the dining room with slow, methodical stomps.

            A voice cackles and screams: “Wena ma-inja! Tsa mor kaka an eefa!”  

            Ekundayo wants to look, but Richard is shaking in his chair, so he has to comfort the boy instead by bending down and offering him more wine.

            “No,” Richard whispers back, “No, I’m-- I’m fine--”

            “Who dares speak?” a voice hisses. “Who dares infests the air I occupy?”

            Richard goes mute and rigid in his seat. Ekundayo isn’t sure what to do, just glances down at the boy until it sounds like someone has leapt onto the table. The rough, low voice is much, much closer.

            “You.”

            Richard squeaks slightly. “It wasn’t me, it was-- it was--”

            A cold, empty laugh. “Silence.”

            “You have to believe me--”

            “I said,” the voice whispers, “silence.”

            Richard speaks not a word. Ekundayo is wondering if he should fetch Richard some smelling salts, and glances up to see-- to see--

            “Well?”

            A boy his age is standing on the table. He is bending low to look not at Richard, but at Ekundayo instead. He has a broad nose, and full lips, and tightly-curled hair, but-- Ekundayo blinks--his short-cropped hair is a pale yellow, and his eyes are a light blue, and he is white, though he is unmistakably African. His accent is decidedly not British, but it’s one Ekundayo hasn’t heard before either. Maybe he’s putting on a voice for the guests--

            Ekundayo stills.

The boy’s gaze burns. A smirk cuts across his face as he leans even closer. “Are you afraid?”

            Ekundayo swallows, and does not look away.

            The boy stares at him for one long moment, unblinking.

            Ekundayo remembers, suddenly, that Nneka had said--she had told him--         

            “Do you really pick your nose?”   

            It’s whispered. It’s likely no one overhears, but Sifiso’s glare could rival the sun. Without a word, he whirls around and begins an erratic dance, limbs flying as he yells, “Free me! Free me!”

            He picks up one of the guests’ plates and waves it around his head. “I despise these-- I hate this--” and he whacks a spoon on his head. “I hate, I hate, I hate!”

            “Would you like some tea, ghost?” William calls out.

            “Never!” Sifiso screams. “My lips shall never touch such leaf-water filth!”

            “Wine then, dear spirit?” Eunice demures, eyes glinting with mirth.

            “Ah,” Sifiso pauses, scratching his chin. “I could perhaps be persuaded,” and the table erupts in relieved laughter and applause.

            Nneka and Obi and other slaves laugh too, though as Sifiso gags on the wine he’d been offered, calling it “fit for pigs” as William takes another sip from his glass, Ekundayo thinks that they laugh for an entirely different reason.

            He laughs too: Sifiso really does pick his nose.

            Sifiso receives a standing ovation. He bows and bows, beaming so wide it looks like it hurts. Something in Ekundayo twists--he has never seen a smile so angry--and then Sifiso leaps off of the table and disappears from the room in a flurry of applause, as though he really is a ghost. As though he cares for nothing. Ekundayo watches him go, and he does not look away until Richard asks for more wine after all.  

            “What did you think?” Nneka asks him, still laughing.

            “It was…” Ekundayo pauses. “I like how we could laugh, too.”

            “Yes,” Nneka nods, “yes, exactly.”

            Richard has a nightmare that night. “A ghost,” he whispers to Ekundayo, “a ghost tried to take me away.”

In the dark, Ekundayo smiles.

Four

            Ekundayo meets Sifiso in the dawn, before he leaves for the docks. He is sleeping outside of Richard’s door for the night-- “in case the ghost from my dreams tries to steal me away”-- and feels a boot prod his knee.

            “...What--?”

            “You.”

            Ekundayo blinks and yawns. “My name is Ekundayo.”

            Sifiso glares down at him. “You almost ruined everything last night.” The boot presses harder into Ekundayo’s knee. “Never do that again.”

            Ekundayo holds up his hands. “Yes, yes.”

            “I mean it.”

            Ekundayo almost rolls his eyes. “I’ll be sure to tremble in fear before you, next time.”

            Sifiso’s scowl intensifies. “Who even told you that I-- who told you such lies?”

            “Nneka.”

            A pause.

            “I hate her.”

            Ekundayo snorts, he can’t help it. “I’m sure you do.” He has a few minutes to himself before he has to begin his duties. The hallway is hushed in the soft dawn light, and Ekundayo’s back is stiff from being propped against the door.

            Ekundayo takes Sifiso’s boot in his hands. Before Sifiso can kick him or protest, Ekundayo says, “Thank you.”

            Sifiso frowns. “What?”

            Ekundayo smiles sleepily up at him. “Richard was so afraid of you that he dreamed that you were coming to take him away.” He gently lifts the boy’s boot, and places it on the floor. “He said a ghost was going to steal him.” He yawns again and removes his hands from Sifiso’s boot. “So thank you. For last night.”        

            Sifiso’s frown fades, though now he looks a little lost. After a moment, he puffs out his chest. “He should be afraid of me. Every Guthrie should.”

            “Yes.”

            Sifiso smirks, his yellow, almost white hair glowing in the pale light. “I’m happy to be of service.”

            Ekundayo raises an eyebrow. “Are you?”

            Sifiso’s smirk widens, and he steps closer. “What do you think, Ekundayo?”

            There’s a noise behind the door. Richard must be waking.

            Ekundayo sighs. “I have--”

            Sifiso finishes, “I have to go.”

            Before Ekundayo can say, “Goodbye,” or, “It was nice to meet you,” Sifiso has dashed off, boots heavy and loud, oversized coat billowing out behind him.

            Smothered under his pile of blankets, Richard whispers, “Was that the ghost?”

            “Don’t worry,” Ekundayo tells him, biting the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. “I scared him away.”

            Richard nods. “Good. Ghosts aren’t real, obviously-- “

            “Obviously.”

            “Don’t interrupt, if you please.”

            “Of course, sir.”

            “As I was saying,” Richard dictates as he climbs out of bed while Ekundayo prepares his clothes for him, “Ghosts aren’t real. But one must be cautious, is all. Especially with that madman Father keeps around.”

            Ekundayo makes a noncommittal sound in the back of his throat. He holds out Richard’s dress shirt, and thinks of all of the cowries his family spent on the priest, of how his iya’s voice went raw from telling so many stories, just to get the abiku to stay. He thinks of the bush, and everything Richard Guthrie will never know.

            “I don’t know why Father keeps him at all.” Richard puts one arm through the sleeve, then the other. “He’s far too ugly and unnatural to entertain anybody. Hardly a parlor trick anyone would want to see.”

             Ekundayo helps Richard dress, and tugs a bit too hard on his pant legs. “He seemed to entertain the entire table last night, if I recall correctly.”

            “Well--” Richard huffs. “Well, I still think he’s a monster. Should be sent back to the jungle, I think.”

            “Why did your father take him, then?”

            Richard startles. “What did you say?”

            Ekundayo buttons the boy’s light blue jacket carefully, precisely, and smoothly, without error. _There is a spirit in me. You should be afraid._ “Nothing, sir.”

            Richard watches him. “Good.”

            Ekundayo watches as the boy smiles to himself, apparently pleased at having won whatever test of wills he was imagining. He doesn’t say a word as Richard beckons him to leave and prepare his breakfast.

           Ekundayo talks to Nneka whenever he can once Richard’s left for school.

           “Why do you think violence is good?”

            Ekundayo sighs as he scrubs the kitchen floors. “We’ve talked about this. I don’t think it’s good, but I do think it’s necessary.”

            Nneka shakes her head. “Do you have no imagination?”

            Ekundayo laughs, startled. “What?”

           “Do you really think the gods want us to kill each other?”

           “I think that depends on the orisha.” Ekundayo looks at Nneka. “And if I didn’t have an imagination, I would not be here.”

            Nneka pauses from scrubbing. “I suppose that’s right.”

           “It is.”

           “But violence is never right, Ekundayo. It’s never justified.”

           “What about the Guthries, hm? What about the people who stole you away? What about-- ?”

            “I hate them.” Nneka’s voice is low and cold. She is small and slight, and in that moment Ekundayo has no doubt that she could end each of them, one by one. “I hate them all. The people who took me deserve nothing but the gods’ wrath. But I will never betray my kingdom, not for them and not for anyone.” Her back straightens. “I will never go against Chukwu, our creator. I will never defy Anyanwu, the Light we must all strive to become, or Agbala, the goddess who will lead us to Anyanwu if we swear our oaths. If we live peaceful and just lives.” Nneka’s gaze burns into him. “The Guthries are not worth my hate. They are not worth my time, my thoughts, my energy, or my notice. They are not worth anything at all.”

            Ekundayo swallows. After a moment, he looks at the now-spotless kitchen floor. “We agree on that, at least.”

            Nneka laughs, the anger dissipating in the air. “We can be friends after all.”

            Ekundayo grins. “Yes, I suppose so.” After working in silence for a few minutes, a thought occurs to him. “Do you ever think about how we’re friends because we’re slaves for the same people?”

            Nneka raises her eyebrows. “What?” She whacks his elbow with her sudsy brush. “You’re ridiculous. We aren’t friends because of slavery. We are friends in spite of it.”

            There’s a lump in his throat, and before he cries, Ekundayo launches his own brush at Nneka’s head. She ducks, cackling, and before they finish scrubbing they are covered in suds.

            “What happened here?” Obi asks, standing over them.

            “A great violence,” Nneka giggles, and Obi shakes his head.

            “Clean up before the Guthries see you.”

            “Obviously.”

            Obi leaves, and shortly after a serving girl enters the kitchens with a tray. “I’ve got to prepare for tea, if--if you’re ready?”

            Before Ekundayo can say anything, Nneka shoots up, almost slipping on the floor. “Ruth! Of course, of course-- my friend and I, we-- I’m a mess, I’m so sorry-- got carried away-- you make lovely tea, you know, or I’m sure it’s lovely, everything you do is lovely--I’m sorry, we’ll be on our way--”

            Ekundayo stands, knees sore and surely bruised. Ruth, chubby and short and beautiful, is trying very hard not to laugh. Her skin is smooth and dark, and her eyes gleam. As her smile widens, Ekundayo sees her dimples.

            Nneka, still spluttering, nearly slips again.

            Ekundayo puts a hand on her shoulder. “We’ll be leaving now.”

            He steers Nneka out of the kitchens, exchanging a look with Ruth as he goes.

           “So,” he says, once him and Nneka have dried off their suds with some extra rags, “that’s Ruth.”

           “Don’t say a word,” Nneka whispers, and Ekundayo laughs and laughs.

           “I knew you liked her, but that’s-- that’s something else--”

           “Quiet!” Nneka’s blush deepens. “You’ve-- you’ve seen her! You understand why I-- why I’m such a fool around her.”

           Ekundayo bumps her shoulder with his own. “Oh yes, I understand.” He whispers back, “You’re right. She’s lovely.”

           Nneka nods, smile soft and far away. “She’s beautiful.”

           “You should tell her.”

            Nneka startles. “What? No, no I can’t-- it’s not that simple--”

          “It can be.” Ekundayo shrugs, and thinks about how he hadn’t said goodbye, the last time he had seen his family. “Sometimes it’s that simple.” He coughs. “If Ruth...if she didn’t care for you, she wouldn’t have smiled so much.”

           “You don’t know that-- she’s like that with everyone--”

           “Tell her.”

            “No.”

           “Tell her.”

            “No--”

            The front door of the house slams. Richard is back from school.

            Before Ekundayo goes, he says, “Tell her,” and Nneka can’t say anything back because he’s hurried out of her sight.

            Eunice has gotten to Richard first. “Darling, there’s no need to slam the door...tell me why you’re upset, hm? What’s on your face-- here, let me see--”

            Richard breaks away from his mother’s grasp, wiping his eyes furiously. “Go away-- I don’t want to talk to anyone-- “ and he dashes to his room.

            Ekundayo forces himself to stop smiling (Nneka had almost slipped twice...twice!) and adopts a face he hopes looks concerned. “Ma’m?”

           “Don’t just stand there,” Eunice snaps. “Go after him.”

           So Ekundayo goes after him. What he really wants to do is tease Nneka, and ask her about her nne and nna and brothers and friends, and maybe flick some dust at her nose so she’ll sneeze, but instead he steps into Richard’s room. The door had been slightly ajar. It’s easy to walk in.

           “Go away.”

           Ekundayo sits on his cot. Richard is across from him, curled up in a ball in the middle of his bed.

           “Sir, your mother commanded that I come here.”

            “I don’t care. Leave.”

            Time to change tactics. “Sir, why don’t you tell me what happened? I won’t tell your mother.”

            Richard glances up at him. There’s a bruise forming under his right eye. “Do you swear not to tell her?”

            Ekundayo wonders why Richard would think he’d ever care enough to tell Eunice anything. “I swear.”

            “Alright.” Richard lets out a shaky breath. He’s a boy who isn’t used to keeping things to himself. He’s never had to. “It was during Latin. I was trying to pronounce the words, but then-- “ Richard sucks in a breath. “But then Samuel Simons laughed at me, and the whole class started laughing, so I--” he grits his teeth. “So I didn’t say anything. The teacher was most displeased. And then after class…” Richard curls more tightly in on himself. “Samuel Simons and his mates all teased me, like I was-- like they don’t even know who my father is.” Richard huffs a bit, which means he’s already feeling better. “I told them my father makes more money than any of theirs combined, and that it was beneath me to acknowledge their jealousy, and that’s when Samuel Simons hit me.”

            “Ah.”

            “He hit me, and so did Thomas Bell and Kenneth Worthington. I’m going to tell the headmaster.”

            “That seems to be the right thing to do.”

            “He’s going to expel all of them. I’m sure of it.”

            “Of course, sir.”

            Richard sniffles, and Ekundayo adds, “I’m sorry that that happened to you. Would you like me to attend to your injuries?”

            Richard shrugs, glaring at the floor. “If you please.”

            Ekundayo retrieves the necessary materials from a drawer, and dabs at the bruise under Richard’s eye, and his swollen lip, and the dried blood under his nose. His thin brown hair is askew, and his left wrist is sprained, but his right one is perfectly fine, so he won’t have any trouble writing. The pain will fade soon enough. Overall, Richard’s been a bit tusselled, but no injury is serious enough to warrant the doctor.

            That doesn’t stop the boy from wincing every time Ekundayo dabs his wounds. “Ow!” he hisses. “That hurts!”

            Ekundayo does it once more. “I’m sorry sir, but this will help you heal.”

            “It’s--” Richard grits his teeth. “It hurts.”

            Ekundayo blinks: he is rocking in the ship. Gege is crying next to him, and the cut on his head is scabbed over, but he hurts, he hurts, he hurts-- the doctor forces his jaws open--

             He takes a steady breath. “You’ll be fine in no time at all.” His voice is cold and heavy. It sounds as though it is coming from somewhere outside of him: is this how spirits speak? Richard doesn’t seem to notice. The boy stares at his hands, lost in thought.

            When he is done dabbing Richard’s injuries, Ekundayo sits back on his cot. “Do you need anything else, sir?”

            “No, not at the moment.” Ekundayo relaxes slightly against the wall, but then: “Oh, could you fetch me some tea?”

            Ekundayo leans away from the wall. The boy’s voice sounds so far away. The only thing he can hear with any clarity is Poroyo’s muttering. Ekundayo wobbles to his feet and manages, “Right away, sir,” before stumbling off.

            He passes Nneka in the hallway to the kitchens as she adjusts some paintings on the walls, and her pleased smile pins him to the present. The bush is out of view. Ekundayo shakes sea-water out of his ears. “Tell Ruth how you feel.”

            Nneka sticks her tongue out, not even looking at him. “Never.”

             “...Really--?”

            “Well,” Nneka stammers, “Not-- not never.”

             Ekundayo grins. “I thought so.”

            “Oh, stop it. I heard about you and Sifiso this morning.”

            “What? How did you--”

            “I have my sources. He really wasn’t angry?”

            Ekundayo shrugs. “No.”

           “Huh.”

           “Is...is he always angry?”

           Nneka grins. “Aren’t we all?”

           Ekundayo laughs and heads to the kitchens. He thinks of Lydia tugging extra hard at Mary’s knotted hair, of Ropo wheezing with laughter after one of the white men had slipped on the shit/piss/vomit/blood/water, of Sifiso’s cutting grin.

          “What took you so long?” Richard all but whines.

          “My apologies, sir.” Ekundayo sets the tea tray on Richard’s lap, and hears ocean waves as the tea ripples in its cup. “I wanted to make sure that none of it spilled.”

           Richard blows on the steaming cup. “I suppose that makes sense.”

          “Thank you, sir.”

          Richard sips the tea, and Ekundayo sits on his cot and leans against the wall again.

          His eyes nearly drift shut, but then Richard says, “Thank you. You’re not like the others.” Richard smiles at him. “You really listen.”

          After a moment, Ekundayo answers, “Thank you, sir.”

          Richard waves his hand, careful not to spill his tea in his other hand. “You need a name.”

          Ekundayo blinks. “Sir?”

         “We’ve been calling you ‘boy,’ and that isn’t right at all.”

         “My name is--”

         “Ah!” Richard’s eyes light up. “You’re loyal and a good listener. Dependable and honest. Used to simple living and simple pleasures. You’re just like Scott.”

          Before Ekundayo can say anything, the little white dog, who had been sleeping on the carpet previously, perks up at the sound of his name. The dog rolls over, tongue lolling, and Richard sets his tray down and scratches the dog’s stomach.

         Ekundayo stares. “...Sir?”

         Richard looks up and beams at him. “Do you like your name, Scott?”

         Little Dicky Guthrie is so proud of himself. It’s as though he’s given Ekundayo a rare and precious jewel, or his freedom, and not the name of an animal that eats its own shit.

         Ekundayo wishes Nneka was here to laugh with him.

         “...Thank you, sir.”

         “You’re welcome, Scott.”

          A thought occurs to Ekundayo, and he forces himself not to snort: Nneka is going to have a fit if he pulls this off. “Sir, please...if I may, I would like to be called Mr. Scott.”

          Richard frowns. “What? Why Mr. Scott?”

          Ekundayo takes a breath, and prays to Esu. “I am...honored to have this name, sir, truly I am. Yet I believe that it would cause some confusion, if our name is called and we both answer.”

          Richard rubs his chin. “Yes,” he says after a moment. “Yes, I suppose that’s correct. Well then,” he smiles amicably, “Mr. Scott it is.”

          “Thank you, sir.” He bows his head for good measure.

          “You are most welcome, Mr. Scott.”

           A Guthrie has addressed a slave with a formal title. Ekundayo smiles hard and thanks Esu a thousand times.

           Nneka cackles loudly when he tells her later that day, practically wheezing with laughter, but she still takes his hand in hers, as though he must be handled with the utmost care. “They’ll all have to call you Mister--William Guthrie has to call you Mister! You’re brilliant,” she manages, wiping an eye. “I can tell you which herbs to use to make Dicky sick, you know.” Nneka looks carefully at him, smile softening. “Ekundayo,” she murmurs, and something loosens in his shoulders, his chest. “What does your name mean?”

           Ekundayo swallows. “Sorrow becomes joy.”

           Nneka peers at him. “There’s a story there.”

          “Yes.” Ekundayo leans against her, and she leans against him. “It is a protection.” He bites his lip. “It keeps me safe.”

          “You tell that story to me tomorrow, and I’ll tell you how I got my name. The Guthries call me Nancy, you know.” Nneka laughs lightly, but Ekundayo sees the tightening around her eyes.            He squeezes her hand as she whispers, “They can pretend all they like. They will never have my name. They don’t deserve to speak it.”

          “No. No, they don’t.”

          They breathe together. Do Folami and Abeni visit each other often? Do they miss him? Do they have friends like this?

          “Nneka,” he whispers, “Thank you.”

          She leans closer, and before he can do anything she’s reached up and kissed his cheek. “We’re friends, you silly boy. No need to thank me.”

          Before she can move away to prepare for supper, Ekundayo wraps his arms around her in a brief, tight hug. She squeaks slightly into his shoulder. “What--?”

          “You’re the silly one,” he mumbles.

          “Oh, hush.”

          They break apart, and even though he feels the loss of contact, there is a light shining in his chest. He watches Nneka leave, lump in his throat. What does Idijola’s name mean? Atanada’s? Gege’s? Lydia’s? He’d never asked them. He wants to know-- Ekundayo bites his lip. His fingertips trace his cheek, and the light within him beams.

          It is another busy, long day. Eunice fusses over Richard, so there isn’t much Ekundayo can do on that front, although of course the house needs constant tending to. The air is growing brisker. Ekundayo glimpses a stray leaf fall past a parlor window, and almost drops his duster: the leaf is a brilliant orange, not green or dead. He dashes to the window-- no one is there to scold him-- and he watches the leaf drift down to the cobblestone streets below. His breath fogs the window as he presses his nose to the glass: was that real? Is he delirious? Is he dreaming? Then-- Ekundayo blinks wonderingly-- there’s another leaf, this time a fiery red, blowing past. He watches another leaf swirl by, then another, then another. For the rest of the day, Ekundayo sneaks looks out the window as often as he can. He opens a window, on a short break from polishing, and for one glorious moment, he breathes in the crisp, windy air. 

         Scott is fed little scraps of leftover lunch that the Guthries haven’t had the stomach to finish. The dog nibbles at the bits of meat eagerly, tongue slobbering all over their hands, and Ekundayo watches as William smiles at the little thing indulgently, as Eunice pats his pricked ears, as Richard bends down low enough for the dog to lick his face. Before company arrives for dinner, Scott jumps up onto one of the seats, and the whole family laughs before William shoos him off.

        Ekundayo laughs too, quietly and beneath their notice, anger sinking deeper and deeper down his throat, curdling his mouth into an absurd grin.

        Nneka meets his eye, smirking back as she mouths, ‘ _Our special dinner.’_

        Sifiso performs again that night, for a new round of the Guthries’ mysterious business partners.

       “A great beast,” William proclaims, “has been captured from the wilds of Africa. Through the thick jungle I searched, until at last, there the monster was…”

        When Sifiso screams and stamps his feet, most of the table flinches.

        “Would you like some tea, spirit?” William calls out merrily.

        “Never!” Sifiso spits back, and instead of staying where he is, like last time, he walks across the table. He crouches until he is eye level with William.

        “Spirit…?”

        Sifiso, very slowly, takes the tea out of William Guthrie’s outstretched hand.

       “Ah,” William tells the table, forced ease injected into his voice, “the beast would like some of our calming herbs after all-- he likes our fine tastes, you see--”

        Sifiso pours the tea onto his head.

        The table gasps-- one man exclaims, “Good God!” and a woman mutters, “Lord,” and Sifiso doesn’t move one bit as the tea drips down his head and onto the table cloth.

         It doesn’t look too hot-- his skin isn’t burning, and there’s only a faint wisp of steam rising from his head-- and Sifiso, blinking tea out of his eyes, places William’s teacup back in front of him with a flourish, pinky raised.

         Before William can say anything, Sifiso slams his fist against his chest. “I hate!” he screams, and the sound tears through his throat, through the air-- “I will eat the flesh off your bones and      drink your blood! Delicious, so delicious, so delicious.” He licks his lips, grinning wide.

        “...Oh, goodness,” a guest mumbles into his cravat.

         Sifiso leaps towards him, smiling and dancing, face pink from the tea. “You! You’ll be the first!”

        “Guthrie,” the woman next to the man trying to burrow into his cravat says, “Please control him, he seems a bit crazed--”

        “Wine, dear spirit?” Eunice asks, perfectly calm as she holds out a spare bottle.

        “Ha!” Sifiso cackles. “Ha, yes! Yes, yes!”

         He lifts the bottle to his lips, and gulps the wine down, down, down-- some of it runs down his chin, and Ekundayo watches as the red droplets drip down his throat.

         William laughs lightly. “There, spirit. There, there.”

         Sifiso sets the bottle down, grin never wavering. “It will be your blood I drink next.”

        “Of course, of course.”

         Sifiso stares right at him. “Of course, of course.”

        “Well,” Eunice says after a moment, “I believe that concludes the evening-- “

         “One more trick!” Sifiso yells, beating his chest again.

         “Oh, let him,” William laughs. “What now, ghost?”

          The table is still and utterly silent. Not a word of protest from anyone. Everyone is rigid in their seats, holding their breath.

           Sifiso’s whole body shudders, and he sinks to a crouch on the table. He mutters nonsense-- the guests surely think it is some mystical jungle language-- and slowly, slowly, rises. He twitches and spasms, eyes squeezed shut, breaths harsh and loud, hands curled tight into fists. Then, limbs rigid, jaw clenched:

          “Please, ladies and gentlemen, excuse my callous behavior.” Sifiso opens his eyes, and suddenly he is fluid and smooth, bowing low in perfect deference. “It was not my intention to harm any of you.” He is solemn, head down. Ekundayo suspects there’s a smile hiding on his lips, then.

         “Please,” Sifiso says in a perfect Guthrie family accent, “forgive a poor fool his merry tricks.”

          Silence. William and Eunice watch him with slightly raised eyebrows, which means they are about to faint from shock.

          Sifiso strides up and down the table, tilting his head like William, lowering his eyes like Eunice. “In the jungle,” Sifiso sighs, “I regret to say that I was most uncouth. Mr. Guthrie, may God bless him, rescued me from my miserable fate.” Sifiso turns his head to William and meets his eyes. “This man saved me, and for that I am ever so grateful, forever and ever, amen.”

          Ekundayo snorts. Obi steps on his toe, and he quiets immediately.

          Sifiso sighs heavily and smiles tremulously, so grave and apologetic that a man dabs his eye with a handkerchief. “Most esteemed ladies and gentlemen,” Sifiso proclaims, arms sweeping wide, “please accept my humble apologies. The jungle lingers in my blood, but every day I pray to better myself.” Sifiso bows low once more, and when he lifts his head, he says, “I thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for allowing me to entertain you tonight. Have pity for a poor sinner.” A slow smile curves across his face. “We all seek to be in His grace.” Sifiso clasps his hands together, falls to his knees, and then, just as suddenly, jumps up again. He paces up and down the table slowly, deliberately, shoulders squared, back straight, chin tilted up.

          “In this way,” Sifiso murmurs, voice low, “I am just--” he points to the guests-- “like”-- he points to Eunice-- “you,” and he points to William.

           Silence.

           Silence.

           Silence.

           And then--the table erupts into applause, crying, “What skill!” and, “Such mimicry!”

          The servants clap too, and the other slaves give him a standing ovation, laughing long and loud, and Sifiso smiles wider.

           Sifiso bows and bows, beaming painfully wide, and for the briefest of moments, his eyes meet Ekundayo’s. The air crackles. Ekundayo forgets to breathe, looking at him, but it is Sifiso who slides his gaze away.

           Ekundayo wants to ask him how he does it, how he evades punishment, how he does this so often, isn’t it draining, doesn’t he deserve to rest, he is amazing, he is braver than any of them--

         “We should clean everything,” Obi tells him, and Ekundayo has to watch Sifiso leave before he can say anything at all.

         “Doesn’t he need to wash off?” Ekundayo asks Nneka as they wash and put away dishes. “Doesn’t he need help?”

          Nneka shakes her head. “No, Sifiso is fine on his own, always has been. He’s been here since he was young, he knows how to take care of himself.” She frowns. “Ekundayo, he’s alright. He wants to be alone after his show. Believe me, I’ve asked. He hates it when people bother him afterwards.”

         Ekundayo nods, still frowning as he dries another plate. “I suppose.”

         The night crawls on.

         “Goodnight, Mr. Scott,” Richard mumbles as he pulls his blankets to his chin.

          Ekundayo doesn’t say anything back. He traces the scars on the underside of his wrist, and sits outside of Richard’s room, back propped against the door, hoping that a boy-ghost will see fit to visit him again.

Five

           Ekundayo doesn’t find Sifiso in the morning, but the boy does return to the Guthrie home the next afternoon.

          “William wants to give this to Richard,” Sifiso mutters, and holds out a small, well-packaged parcel for Ekundayo to take. “It’s an early birthday present.”

           Ekundayo takes the present carefully-- it feels delicate-- and his heart sinks as Sifiso turns away. “Wait.”

           The boy turns, scowling. “I have work to do.”

           “I know, but--” Ekundayo bites his lip. Where are his words? Where is a story when he needs it? “I wanted to tell you, before, but there wasn’t time, and--”

           Sifiso throws his hands up. “Out with it then, I haven’t got time for-- “

          “You’re incredible.” Ekundayo swallows. His face burns, and he forces the words to creak out of his dry mouth. “At dinner, I mean. Your performances…” he stops. “You’re very good.”

           Sifiso raises an eyebrow, though the slight smile he’s trying to hide tells Ekundayo that he’s at least a little pleased. “Well alright then. Best be on my way.” He smirks. “I’ve got to go haunt the docks some more.”

          Ekundayo shakes his head. “You’re not a ghost.”

         “What, and you are?”

          “Yes.” Ekundayo looks right at Sifiso. “You’re not a spirit. But I am.”

          Sifiso stares, smirk widening. “Are you really?”

         “Do you doubt me?”

          “I’m not sure,” Sifiso says, smirk slipping away.

           Ekundayo opens the ornate doors to the house for him. “You’ll have to find out.”

           Sifiso nods slowly, his squinting gaze slower, less certain than it was before. “Yes,” he says, “I’ll have to.” He walks through the door and out onto the bustling street, and does not thank him or look back. Ekundayo watches him stride away with his head held high, tipping his cap to no one.

           Sifiso isn’t a ghost, but people avoid his gaze, his body, his grin; every part of him twists and bends into a shape someone fears.

           They don’t know who the real spirit is. They don’t know anything at all. Ekundayo smiles, and imagines if him and Sifiso performed together, imagines the fear on their faces, imagines Sifiso looking at him with something like a smile, imagines--

           Ekundayo shakes his head, face burning. Why is he blushing over a boy he barely knows? Richard stirs, and Ekundayo pushes those thoughts away. He does not think of Sifiso’s strong arms, or his smirk, or his cackle. He thinks, instead, of how Sifiso does not want to be visited by anybody, after his performances, how tired he seems, how he wants so desperately to be someone’s monster. Ekundayo wants to smooth his brow. That’s all. One friendly gesture from one spirit to another. That is it. That is all.

            “You like Sifiso, don’t you,” Nneka deadpans as Richard takes lessons with his tutor. The early gift William had gotten to celebrate his youngest son’s birth was a book. Richard had not looked particularly pleased, but he accepted it nonetheless, and was presumably discussing it with his tutor presently.

            “What?” The sheet he’d been folding falls to the floor. “I don’t--what--?”

            “Who does he like?”

            Nneka rolls her eyes. “Lelise. You are not invited to this conversation. Please--”

            “I heard you,” Lelise replies breezily, grin bright and unsettlingly fixed as she adjusts a pillow on Mr. and Mrs. Guthrie’s bed. “And so I have a right to ask: who does this boy fancy?”

            “Listen here,” Nneka shoots back, “you wiley fool, you unrepentant interloper, you--”

            “My name is Ekundayo.” He puts a hand on Nneka’s tensed shoulder, and gathers the fallen sheet with his other hand. Lelise swivels her head to look at him, eyes wide and searching. She is beautiful: with her dark skin, graceful, lithe limbs, and regal tilt to her head, she would be the envy of Oyo-Ile and her. And yet her eyes are so hungry that Ekundayo swallows, and almost looks away.

           He catches himself in time, and holds her gaze. “We were talking about Sifiso.”

            Lelise puts a hand to her mouth, almost dropping the pillow case in her other hand. “Sifiso? Is that who you--?”

            “Do you have any objections to our discussion?”

            “No, no, it’s--” Lelise gathers herself, and her grin returns. “Sifiso is, ah...an acquired taste.”

            Nneka rolls her eyes. “He isn’t a meat pie.”

            “Of course not,” Lelise returns smoothly. “I was merely commenting on how...peculiar Sifiso is, in many respects. Surely…” She looks at Ekundayo then. “Surely you know about his attempt to burn down the estate?”

            “Yes.” Ekundayo fits the left corner of the sheet onto the bed. “You had told me.”

            “There are many other instances of his oddity, you know. He has woken up the whole house with his screams in the middle of the night, and he mimics the Guthries to an unsettling degree of likeness. I’ve heard that whenever he goes to the docks, he slips off on some secret business of his, and I tell you...I fear that he may have possessed Guthrie, with the way the man favors him, and before long he’ll have the whole family under his charms and juju. You know,” Lelise leans in then, voice dropping to a whisper, “it’s long been suspected that he poisoned Albert--”

            “That’s enough.”

            Lelise turns to Nneka, lip curling in distaste. “I wasn’t talking to you--”

            “Lelise.” Nneka’s eyes bore into hers. “Sifiso is my friend. And if he burns this house, then I will thank him for it, as should you.”

            Lelise raises an eyebrow. “I shall not thank him for making me destitute and without a home--”

            “You think this is your home?”

            “No,” Lelise says too quickly. “I’m saying that I would rather be here than in the streets.”

            Ekundayo nods. “Of course.”

            Nneka turns to look at him, and Ekundayo adds, “I like having a full stomach. I like having a place to sleep. I like that I can move without shackles.” He shrugs. “These are small things to appreciate. Still.” He stares at Lelise then. “I would like my freedom more.”

            Lelise adjusts the sheet on the upper right corner of the bed until it is perfectly fitted. “You say that now.” She laughs, and it is not a bright sound. “You don’t know what winter is. I would rather be anywhere than in chains. Than dead in the ground.”

            Ekundayo is about to say something, but Nneka snaps, “Go lick the Guthries’ boots somewhere else.”

            Lelise gazes at Nneka. Her face twists. She could swallow the house whole, with those eyes. “As you wish.”

            She leaves without another word.

            When Ekunadyo has smoothed the sheets across the bed, Nneka remarks, voice light, “Lelise is always looking to spread lies.”

            “Mhm.”

            “What, you don’t believe me?”

            “No,” Ekundayo says, “I believe you. I also tell myself stories, you know.”

            “Yes, but they aren’t about real people.”

            “Yes, but I understand why Lelise--”

            “Enough about Lelise.” Nneka fiercely fluffs a plump pillow. “She’s a tiresome bore.”

            “Alright.”

            “I mean it.” Nneka places the pillow amidst the others. “She doesn’t know anything.”

            “Alright.” Ekundayo begins wiping dust off of the books on the bedside table.

            “She doesn’t even know that I was the one who poisoned Albert.”

            The damp cloth nearly slips in Ekundayo’s hand. “What?”

            He swings around, gripping the rag too tightly now.

            Nneka is smiling slightly as she adjusts a single flower in a vase. Her fingers pinch the petals just slightly as she moves the flower so that it is facing the entrance of the room, just how Mrs. Guthrie likes it. “It wasn’t difficult. Sifiso helped me distract everyone long enough for me to mix the concoction into the tea, and then--”

            “Isn’t that against your kingdom? Your faith?”

            Nneka frowns. “What? No, I don’t think--”

            “‘Peace is the most important law, violence is never acceptable,’ all of that was a lie?”

            “I--”

            “You almost murdered someone!”

            Nneka stares hard. Her eyes kill the voice in his throat. “Listen.” Her voice is low. “Listen to me. You don’t know Albert Guthrie.”

            Ekundayo finishes wiping dust, and he walks closer to her. Her hands are shaking. “Nneka--”

            “I was never going to kill him.” She smoothes the sheets on the bed, over and over. “I just wanted him to stop.”

Ekundayo swallows. “...What--?”

            “You two!”

            One of the white servants-- based on what Nneka’s told him, it might be Timothy-- waves his bony hand at them. “You there, boy,” he says, “Richard Guthrie requests your presence in the library.”

            Ekundayo grits his teeth. “Yes.”

            Timothy raises a barely-there eyebrow. “Yes, sir, you mean.”

            “Yes. Sir.”

            Timothy’s smirks, his thin mustache twitching. “Good. Stop chattering like monkeys and get back to work.”

            Ekundayo tightens his fists. His jaw hurts. “Yes--”

            Nneka says, voice quiet, “Get that worm off of your face. I think we both know who the real animal is.”

            Timothy splutters, red-faced, “What? I dare say--this is grounds for insubordination--I never heard such--”

            “Sir,” Ekundayo interrupts, grinning, disbelieving-- did that happen? “We have duties to attend to.”

            Nneka and Ekundayo brush past him, not looking back once.

            Ekundayo can’t help it, he laughs and laughs into Nneka’s shoulder, and she whisper-laughs, “Shh! Shh, we can’t be too loud--”

            “You’re brilliant.”

            They’re at the entrance to the library soon enough. Ekundayo doesn’t even think about it: he hugs her, almost too tightly, and he whispers into her hair, “I don’t know Albert Guthrie, but I know he deserved it.”

            Nneka smiles, and squeezes back harder. “Go see what Little Dicky’s up to.”

            Early afternoon sunlight streams into the library. Richard is tapping his quill incessantly against his parchment, and Mr. Peters is muttering something under his breath.

            Ekundayo watches dust glint in the soft light, and he breathes deep as he walks.

            They see him. Ekundayo straightens, and walks faster. “I was told that I was needed here?”

            Mr. Peters coughs. “Ah. Yes, good, you’ve finally arrived. I have a proposal for a new educational strategy. Mr. Guthrie, will you explain so he can properly comprehend?”

            Richard shifts in his seat, and reluctantly puts the quill down. “Yes.” He coughs and fidgets with the quill. He won’t look at Ekundayo, and stares at the table. “I told Mother and Father about some of my troubles at school, and they’ve deemed it best for my health and education that I withdraw from school, and that Mr. Peters becomes a live-in tutor.”

            “Ah.”

            “The school wasn’t prestigious anyway, not for families of, shall we say, higher standing. Anyway.” Richard tap-tap-taps the quill against his arm now. Ekundayo wonders if he’ll have to wash ink stains out of the sleeve. “Mr. Peters believes that in order for me to receive a better, more comprehensive social and academic education, I must become a teacher myself.” He glances at Ekundayo then, cheeks red. “It has been proposed that I may learn better by educating you. Mr. Peters will teach you to read and write, and I will do the rest.”

            Ekundayo nods. “I am...honored by this gift. Thank you, sir. I look forward to learning-- “

            Mr. Peter’s glare is withering. “You look forward to furthering this young man’s education, you mean.”

            _May Esu curse you all to dust._ “Of course, of course.”

            Richard shifts in his seat. “Yes, yes, this will be very, ah, exciting. Thank you, Mr. Scott. I look forward to teaching you.”    

            He forgets, sometimes, the name Richard has given him. After a moment, he bobs his head again, and listens as Mr. Peters describes their new schedule-- Ekundayo will be learning in the dawn, before the household wakes and before he begins his duties. Arrangements are made. Richard looks embarrassed and relieved. Mr. Peters looks increasingly smug. Ekundayo wonders how much the man is being paid. He wonders what it would be like to suffer taunts and be able to withdraw from the people who hurt you.

            Nneka tells him that he can learn more about how to best mock the Guthries, now, and both of them ignore Lelise when she inevitably asks them what they’re chattering on about. Obi, as usual, takes great care in cooking dinner, and chatters on about ingredients, temperature, proper tenderness, the right amount of salt and pepper for the Guthries’ bland tastes. It seems the man’s three great loves are food, sleep, and spotless floors. Nneka teases him, but when Obi offers her some of the squash he’s seasoned properly, she demands more. Obi laughs, holding the spoon away from her.

            “My girl,” he says, “you know we only get whatever is left. Someday, I will make a feast for us.”

            “Do you promise?”

            Obi smiles, some of his sternness softening. “Of course.”

            Sifiso is there for dinner, but he doesn’t perform. There are only a few guests tonight, church friends of Eunice’s and two of William’s business partners. Sifiso works in the kitchen for the night, not appearing to the guests at all. Ekundayo watches him furiously scrub a plate, and when he looks up, Ekundayo looks away immediately.

            Nneka raises an eyebrow, and Ekundayo sighs. “Please don’t say anything.”

            “Hm? What is there to say?”

            “...Good.”

            When the dishes are cleared, cleaned, and dried, when the floor is swept, when most of the candles are blown out, Ekundayo taps Sifiso on the shoulder as the boy inspects the sink for crumbs.

            The boy whirls around. “What?”

            Ekundayo holds up a hand. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-- “

            Sifiso rolls his eyes. “What do you want?”

            Ekundayo swallows. “I don’t-- I just wanted to ask...Nneka said that she can’t be in the sun too long, and I was wondering--do you-- ?”

            Sifiso looks at him like he is an infant. “The sun doesn’t touch me. I wear a cap, long sleeves, trousers, a scarf...many layers. Guthrie doesn’t care, said I was strong enough for anything.”

            Ekundayo frowns. “That’s...that doesn’t make sense--”

            “Of course it doesn’t,” Sifiso snorts. “But I’m not weak. I’ve been doing this since I was ten. I can take care of myself.” He curls his lip and spits out his words like sparks. “I don’t need anyone’s pity, least of all the new boy’s.”

            Ekundayo grits his teeth. “I don’t-- what? I’ve been here for more than a month, I’m hardly new, and secondly, I don’t pity you.” Sifiso snorts again, and Ekundayo snaps, “Your ears are red. I wanted to ask if you needed a better cap. Richard has plenty of old ones he never wears.”

            Sifiso touches an ear, and mutters a curse under his breath. “That,” he growls, “is because I am angry.”

            “Oh.” Ekundayo studies Sifiso’s stony face, his hunched shoulders. “I’m not sorry.”

            Sifiso tsks. “I don’t care.”

            “I think you do.”

            “I don’t need your apology.”

            “Good. I would never apologize for being decent.”

            “Nosy, more like.”

            Ekundayo rolls his eyes. “It’s not my fault for noticing you.”

            “Of course.” An empty smirk carves across Sifiso’s face. “I’m always noticed.”

            “That’s not--” Ekundayo sighs. “I would notice you if you were a spider on the floor. I would notice you if you were a leaf in the wind. It’s not....I saw your ears. I thought I would ask if you would like another cap. Good night.”

            Ekundayo walks away, and he is almost out of the kitchen when he hears a grunted, “Wait.”

            Ekundayo turns. Sifiso is leaning against the sink, arms crossed, scowl shifting into something else. “You said you were a spirit.”

            “Yes.”

            “Well? Are you?” Sifiso’s glare fixes on him. “Show me.”

            “Do you think I am a magic trick?” Ekundayo shakes his head and smirks slowly. “Now who’s being nosy?”

            Sifiso’s ears grow more pink. Ekundayo leaves without looking back. He needs his sleep. He has a long day of learning tomorrow. Yet Richard keeps him awake with his sleep-talk, and Ekundayo shifts and shifts in his little cot, wondering why Sifiso is so stubborn, and why he is curious, if he is so angry, if he doesn’t care at all.

Six

            The English language is as irritating as flies on mule dung. It doesn’t help that Ekundayo is awake before the sun is, that he is so tired that he can barely think in Yoruba, let alone English.

            “Again,” Mr. Peters says. “Recite them again.”

            “A,” Ekundayo bites out, “B, C, D…”

            The man teaches memorization and not much else. Ekundayo’s memory is not terrible, but he learns better by doing, and it takes weeks for Mr. Peters to fully believe that Ekundayo can use a quill and ink. Ekundayo thinks of the scars on his wrist--he feels them every night, each mark--and writes just as slowly and carefully as he had carved himself.

            Lessons with Richard are no better. The boy expects Ekundayo to know things like who the king of England is, and also asks him if he really did live in the jungle, if he spoke to his people through yells and shrieks.

            Ekundayo stares at Richard, with his thin hair and sweaty forehead, and says, very calmly, “Koni da fun e.”

            “What?” Richard whips his head up from his parchment. “What did you say?”

            He almost seems excited, eyes bright and alert.

            Ekundayo smiles, and prays to Esu. “Koni da fun e. It means, in my language, that you are a great prince destined for great things.”

            Richard smiles, and pats Ekundayo’s arm. “Thank you, Mr. Scott. What a kind thing to say.”

            The boy happily goes back to lecturing Ekundayo on the king of England, a wide grin on his weak-chinned face, not knowing that Ekundayo has cursed him, not just for this moment, but for the rest of his life to come.

            Koni da fun e.

            Nothing good will come to you.

            A slight breeze picks up in the library. Ekundayo has spoken the curse, and so it travels through the air, and so it will be settle into Richard Guthrie’s bones, the next time he takes a breath.

            Nneka, Ekundayo learns, does not quite know how to write, but she does know how to read a little. It takes her a while, but she understands eventually. Sifiso does not know how to read or to write. He stomps off shortly after announcing this loudly after dinner, and Ekundayo cannot believe how fragile his pride is until Ruth whispers to him at tea-time the next day, “Sifiso’s been here longer than almost all of us. The Guthries still have not taught him. He’s very sensitive, you know.”

            “Oh, I know.”

            Ruth raises an eyebrow. “You say that as if that’s a bad thing. If I were him, living with these people for so long, I would have folded into myself long ago. And yet there he is, his heart open for everyone to see.”

            Ekundayo hums in the back of his throat. “You’re very wise.”

            Ruth laughs. “You and Nneka seem to think so. I’m not sure if anyone else does.”

            Ekundayo shakes his head. “You are as lovely as Nneka says, and as wise.”

            Ruth turns away spluttering about sugar in the tea, and Ekundayo has to hold back a giggle.

            One afternoon, Sifiso does work around the house. It seems that Guthrie is away on business, and work at the docks has been stalled for the time being.

            They scrub the floors in silence, until Ekundayo says, voice cracking, “You know numbers better than I ever could.”

            Sifiso snorts. “Mhm.”

            “I mean it! I’ve seen you calculate shipments and payments so quickly, all in your mind, before a stone hits the ground.”

            “Why,” Sifiso asks, voice cutting as always, “are you trying to flatter me?”

            His ears are red again. Ekundayo doesn’t mention it, just stares for a moment.

            “I’m not,” Ekundayo manages as his elbow nearly slips in suds. “I’m telling the truth. You’re skilled with numbers.”

            “What does that have to do with anything?” Sifiso huffs, gritting his teeth as he works on a particularly stained part of the floor. “It’s what I have to do.”

            Ekundayo sighs. “I’m simply...I wanted to apologize. For upsetting you earlier.”

            Sifiso shakes his wrists, his calloused hands trembling slightly from the effort of scrubbing this section of the floor. “I don’t care.”

            Ekundayo puts his brush down. “You don’t care.”

            “No. Close your mouth and let me work in peace.”

            “Interesting.” Ekundayo starts scrubbing again, his knees aching, his wrists sore. “So you won’t care at all when I tell you the story of how I am a spirit, then.”

             Sifiso’s shoulders twitch. “...No.” The heat in his voice is snuffed out.

             Ekundayo smirks only a little bit. He closes his eyes and speaks with his iya’s story-telling voice. “Once,” he whispers in the chilled air, “I was in the spirit world with the other abikus. We hid away from everything and laughed, danced, and planned. Eventually, it was my turn to descend to the earth. So I entered a woman’s body, took the form of her daughter and then her son, and both times I left their empty shells behind before they had spoken one word. An abiku, you know, doesn’t earn cowries through ordinary means: we collect the tears of the grieving family for their buried child, along with their stolen lineage, and then we sell it all for cowries with the other spirits in our bright markets.”

             Sifiso doesn’t say anything, just scrubs harder, but Ekundayo can tell that he is listening, because he’s doing it all much more slowly than before.

             “I entered the woman a third time. Surely this would be another success. But the family summoned the babalawo, the father of secrets, and he chased me to the spirit world. He climbed his way to our bright markets, and his eyes saw everything.” Ekundayo grits his teeth. “That wretched, nasty priest discovered the secret oaths I had made with the other abikus.” Ekundayo swallows, and absently traces the scars under his wrist. “I was trapped. I could not escape this body. I tried and tried, but this child’s twelfth rainy season passed, and I am sealed here, now, forever. I have not seen the spirit world in so long.” Ekundayo drops his head. “I see through these eyes. There is sweat on my brow and my knees are bruising. I am here, but I am not of this world.” Ekundayo feels a little foolish saying all of this, but in a dry, cracked voice, he speaks the story. “I don’t remember much of before. I dream of the bush. Of my home. I want to go back, always, but I never do.” He smiles slightly at the newly polished spot on the floor. “Sometimes, I float above this shell, and I see the world beyond this one. Someday I’ll return to that place. Maybe I’ll even remember enough to miss it.”

            Eventually, they’re almost done with the floors when Sifiso grunts, “You killed your sister and brother. The spirit, I mean.”

           “What? No, not at all. I was them.” For a moment, Ekundayo squeezes his eyes shut. One of his first memories was his iya and baba crying as they stood over him. He’d had a cough. They were so worried they hadn’t slept until he was better. He remembers, too, visiting his sister and brother for the first time, and touching the small, sun-warmed mounds of earth with his finger tips. Ekundayo opens his eyes and takes a breath. “I am only one abiku. I had two other forms, hers and his, and now I am this one.”

           Sifiso nods. He curls his hands into fists. “I killed my umama. I screamed out of her, and she didn’t say anything back.” He laughs. “My ubaba forgave me. He held me in his arms when everyone else wanted me dead.” Sifiso’s voice is low, and so quiet that Ekundayo has to strain to listen. “They said I had tricked him into loving me.” He shrugs slightly. “I wish I was a spirit. I wish I could fool everyone into doing my bidding.” Ekundayo can hear the crack in his voice as Sifiso turns away from him. “I wish that my ubaba was here, but I don’t-- I don’t want to remember.”

           Ekundayo blinks. “I knew someone who said that too.” He stands shakily-- tea time will be soon, and he needs to change into a nice, presentable outfit for the Guthries to sniff at. “I am already not real. I need to remember.”

           Sifiso’s knees look even more bruised than his. He tries to stand, but he’s shaking all over. He clenches his jaw, spits out, “Fuck the Guthries, fuck this, can’t even do this one thing-- this one fucking thing--”

          Ekundayo clears his throat. After a moment, he offers his hand.

          Sifiso shakes his head: “No, don’t bother, I don’t need that--”

          He almost slips on the newly cleaned floor.

          Ekundayo keeps his hand outstretched. A bird sings by the nearby window. Nneka has told him that it’s a mourning dove. He remembers his little bird, healed and content, dozing its little head in the crook of his neck.

          Sifiso takes his hand. He doesn’t meet Ekundayo’s eyes, just clenches his jaw tighter.

          Ekundayo turns away to find Obi and the others for tea-time, but then:

         “I’m sorry.”

         Ekundayo stiffens and turns around, but Sifiso is already gone.

         Ekundayo smiles wonderingly into the empty, shining space, and lingers there for a moment longer. The mourning dove calls softly, and he leaves with its song in his ears.

Seven

           Weeks pass.

           On a spare piece of parchment, Ekundayo writes ‘Mr. Scott’ in a careful and steady hand. The ink only smudges when Richard’s voice stings his ear: “Good work!”

           The boy claps him hard on the shoulder. Ekundayo flinches. He can’t concentrate for the rest of the lesson.

           Outside, the world is yellow and red and orange and brown. The sky is cloudy, rainy, pale blue, brilliantly bright. The air is wet and windy. Ekundayo is asked to run errands outside on occasion, but...he blinks one day in the bright sunlight. This time, he doesn’t remember the last time he was outside. He breathes deep. He hears the bird calls of this strange place. Ekundayo counts each and every step of being almost free as he goes about the Guthries’ errands. White people’s glares and curious glances prick at him, but he doesn’t look up. Such a thing is dangerous here, and besides, he doesn’t want to meet the eyes of someone who thinks he is a simple errand boy anyway. He counts his steps instead, and feels the sun warm his head. It’s not as bright as it is in Kingston or in Oyo-Ile, but at least it is here, shining down upon him and into him.

           On the way back from picking up and delivering packages, Ekundayo sets the Guthries’ requested packages down, and plucks little red berries from a scraggly tree struggling to grow in a narrow stretch of cobblestone street. There are occasional carriages rushing past--the smell of horse dung hits his nose, and Ekundayo sees Simisola and Jokotoye for a moment, trotting away from him, and he reflexively coughs to get hay out of his mouth. Ekundayo shakes his head--the city is heady with the tangy scent of the sea, and of horse shit and dirt--and concentrates on placing the berries on the ground in front of him. After a few moments, a bird--a sparrow, maybe--lands near him. He crouches, careful not to crunch any leaves, and waits. The sparrow eats his little trail of berries, and Ekundayo holds his breath when the little bird is almost touching his outstretched hand. The berry is a precious and shining jewel in his palm. The sparrow hops closer, head tilted-- Ekundayo doesn’t breathe, waits and waits--and the sparrow flies off. He smiles to himself, and tosses the berry on the ground. He pats a stray cat later on in the journey, her striped brown head so fluffy that he can hardly believe that it’s happening. His hands haven’t touched anything so soft since...Ekundayo blinks. Since when?

           The cat saunters off. The air stings the back of his throat, and Ekundayo hurries the rest of the way back.

            Eunice hosts weekly meetings with her friends. Much wine is had. Ekundayo pours them glass after glass, along with Ruth and Sam and Stuart, pale, glum brothers who just want to be lawyers instead of servants. Occasionally even Edna is summoned for this occasion, based on her expertise and timely placement of filled glasses for the women to enjoy. Still, Edna is rarely ever around for large gatherings: she is short, squat, and elderly, and her constant, silent glare haunts everyone in the household. Lelise’s eye may be hungry, but Edna’s have planned the deaths of everyone in this house down to the last detail.

            On this particular late afternoon, under Edna’s heavy stare, Eunice and her friends sip their wine, laugh nervously, and talk and talk and talk. There are discussions on church:

           “We should really allow women to participate more in the services--”

            On labor:

            “Why must we always scrub and cook and clean and manage the household? Why must we be satisfied with a life God would not wish upon anyone--?”

            On neighbors:

            “I heard that Miss Lennox--yes, Francine’s daughter--has a certain...personal matter to attend to...may the Lord forgive her and the family for such foolishness--opening her legs to anyone, like some lustful Eve--remember when she was such a sweet girl--?”

            On slavery:

            “Oh, well...yes. I don’t believe it’s right, if I am being entirely honest, between myself and God. Yet this is a necessary evil--William would not like to hear me speaking this way, and besides, we treat all of them with great kindness and civility. I am certain that God will see it for what it is: a mercy and a blessing--”

            Everyone drinks more wine, and then the women get out their Bibles and pray.

            Almost all of the of the servants and most of the slaves go to church, if not out of genuine love for the Lord than out of a desire to get out of the house. Obi attends services sometimes, much to Ekundayo’s raised eyebrow.

            Obi levels him with his usual cool stare, and Ekundayo holds his tongue. “The orishas are not here,” Obi says, smooth and certain as always. “They abandoned us long ago, the bickering fools. If I find comfort in a new god, if I pray to a god made of this soil and this blood and this light in the trees…” Obi shrugs. “This god is strange. I pray anyway. Get back to work.”

            Ruth does not attend church, though she does believe in one God. “We call him HaShem,” she whispers to Ekundayo on a Sunday afternoon, after they have passed the toiling time with stories, and Ekundayo has finished telling Ruth about Esu and the cap of two colors.

            Ruth leans in closer, and makes sure no one is in earshot. “We have to keep everything a secret, mum always said. The Guthries and the other Christians hate us--the Jews, I mean--for silly and cowardly reasons. We pray anyway.” Ruth winks at him. She squeezes his shoulder and gets back to sweeping the floor.

            “This,” Richard tells Ekundayo one sleepy morning, “is Homer.”

            Ekundayo barely understands a word of it, and nearly nods off when Richard reads from the thick book in a monotonous, stilted voice. War, bloodshed, too-long names: what does any of it matter to him?

            “Albert’s coming back,” Nneka tells him while they dust one day. “He’s coming back for a visit. He’ll be here in a month or so.” She doesn’t say anything else for the rest of the day. She doesn’t talk to anyone, not even Ruth.

            Ekundayo tries to catch her eye at dinner when Sifiso whistles impressively loudly as a part of his entrance routine for the evening, but she is staring at the floor instead.

            By the next day, Nneka is her usual shining self, though Ekundayo notices that her smiles are tight and controlled.

            “Nneka,” he whispers to her as they prepare afternoon tea, “are you well--?”

            “I have an older brother and a younger brother,” Nneka says, smiling as she pours the tea, smiling as she arranges the teacups perfectly, smiling as a drop of it lands on her finger by mistake. “Ikenna and little Udo.”

            “...I have many siblings, but the closest are my sisters.”

            “That’s lovely,” Nneka grins, “I always prayed for a sister,” and Ekundayo does not speak of Albert Guthrie for the rest of the day.

            The air grows so cold and bitter--Ekundayo shivers and shivers in the house. Still, Sifiso performs one night, dancing across the table, shouting and screaming with a fraction of his anger, and when their eyes meet, just for a second, Ekundayo is so warm all over that he can’t breathe.

            Dawn after gray dawn, Mr. Peters deigns to instruct him on the finer points of Homer. The sky is almost always the color of mothballs, of clumps of dust and hair that Ekundayo sweeps away. Ekundayo neither knows nor cares about Homer, and only memorizes Latin phrases and Greek names that make him want to laugh at how silly it all sounds. He just wants to sleep. He wants to close his eyes and drift away. His arms and legs are sprawling out of him like a spider’s, his body aches, he has zits on his cheeks--he had heard from Abeni and Folami and his older brothers about how awful this part of life is, and now he would give anything to ask them, maybe, if they’d help him control his cracking voice.

            The sky is the color of the rainy season. If he listens hard enough, he can hear Abeni and Folami bickering. In the dull, dragging dawn, Ekundayo tugs at one of his chin hairs during lessons with Peters to keep himself awake, to keep him in his body.

            There is a dusting of white on the ground one day, a Wednesday or a Thursday, Ekundayo never keeps track-- and it looks soft and feathery, like the little injured bird who had perched on his shoulder before flying back to the marketplace. Ekundayo wants to go out and touch these white feathers, but he can’t, he has work to do--and after he is finished cleaning Richard’s room he sees Nneka sitting very still on the carpet leading to the Guthries’ room.

            She smiles wide. The carpet is spotless. Nothing is out of place. Ekundayo feels his heart sink to his toes when Nneka’s face is stretched even thinner by her grin. “My friend is here to bless me!”

            Ekundayo smiles back, but he also asks, “Is...is he coming soon?”

            Nneka blinks slowly, her smile fading. “I hope not.”

            “....What….never mind, you don’t have to say anything.”

            Nneka curls herself into a tight ball, her delicate limbs constricted and hugged tight.  

            Ekundayo shifts closer to her. Her hands are shaking.

            “One of the first days I came here,” she mumbles, “I was mopping up his spilled wine. It was all over the rug in the parlor, red everywhere. It was like someone had died. I was sweating in the middle of winter, can you believe it, it was that difficult to clean. He came right in the middle of it. He didn’t apologize for intruding, of course, but he didn’t leave either.” Nneka swallows. “He watched me. He sat on a chair and watched. And then...when I had finished, he...he smiled, and said to stay a while.”

            Bile rises in Ekundayo’s throat. “...Nneka--”

            “Albert Guthrie said, ‘I want to draw you. Stay here.’ And he did. Got out his supplies, quill and ink and special parchment. I couldn’t--I tried, I told him that I have my duties, or as best I could, anyway, I hadn’t grasped this language yet, and he laughed. I stayed.”

            “That’s-- that’s--”

            “He said, ‘I’ve never seen anyone like you before.’ He tried to take my hand.” Nneka shakes her head and blinks hard. “Sifiso was the only one to visit me when I was making a mess of myself in the dining room after everyone else had left. He had seen Albert’s drawing. So had most of the household, I had left it in the middle of the parlor like a fool...so many weeks of suspicion, of Lelise telling lies...Mrs. Guthrie wanted me out, it took so long to convince them to let me stay...and that night, Sifiso hadn’t said anything about the drawing. He told me that Albert watches him, too. It seems that the eldest Guthrie son has…” Nneka waves her hand. “Eccentric tastes.”

            She leans into him. They breathe together.

            “So you didn’t plan to kill him.”

            “No.” Nneka’s gaze hardens. “I would never kill anyone. I had tried talking to him, I had tried leaving the room whenever he entered, I had tried and tried, and when I was fixing his mess of a study, you know what I found? More drawings.” Nneka sighs into the crook of his neck. “I just wanted it to end.”

            Ekundayo brushes a hair away from her forehead. “So the poison…?”

            “Got it from Penny--you don’t know her well yet, but believe me I nearly collapsed from shock when she gave me the recipe. So I used it in his tea. He was bedridden for weeks. He blamed it on an illness that had been going around, and when the other slaves and servants started talking, Sifiso said that he’d done it. Almost got reported to the Guthries, until Obi and Penny stepped in. When he recovered, Albert left for England. We haven’t seen him since.”

            Ekundayo kisses the top of her head. “My orishas would praise me if I killed him.”

            Nneka giggles through her sniffling. “I’ll remember that.”

            “I’m sorry,” Ekundayo whispers into her hair, “I’m so sorry--”

            “Shh.” Nneka shifts even closer to him. “Let’s rest. Just for a moment—”

            “Nancy!”

             One of the white servants. The one with the high, nasally voice. Cynthia, maybe?

             Ekundayo says, “I can go. You can rest.”

             Nneka mutters curses under her breath. “No. Cynthia’s just waiting for a chance to punish me-- she’s in love with Albert, the fool, and she’s convinced that I’ve had some secret tryst with him. Half the household think so too.” She grasps Ekundayo’s hand, and they stand together.

             Ekundayo watches her go, and when he bumps into Edna while heading to the kitchens to prepare for tea, he does not shrink from her gaze. He meets it, and she gives him a tiny nod. He wonders, then, if she’d given Sifiso the match.

             Nneka passes out biscuits to the Guthries and their friends, Cynthia watching her every move with squinting distaste--so much of the household avoids Nneka, doesn’t meet her eye, and now he knows why, and now-- now Ekundayo has had enough. None of Nneka’s smiles are real unless she’s with Ruth, Sifiso, Obi, or him.  Her fists clench when Eunice complains that the biscuits are too dry. She has had enough.

             The next day, Lelise waggles her eyebrows while they clean up lunch. “Nneka, you must be thrilled.”

             Nneka grits her teeth and tosses a piece of uneaten ham to Scott, waiting with his little mouth agape. “What?”

              Lelise’s smug grin widens. “I’ve received word that the eldest Guthrie son is to arrive imminently, perhaps in a week or so.” She nudges Nneka with her shoulder. “Isn’t that exciting-- ?”

              Nneka grips Ekundayo’s hand, and they leave together.

              They have had enough.

              They find Sifiso after dinner-- no performance tonight, one of Guthries’ merchant friends is terrified of spirits--and he turns to Nneka. “What do you want to do?”

               Nneka grabs both of their hands. “Let’s celebrate.” She doesn’t wipe her tears. She sniffs with a snot-clogged nose, and she doesn’t smile. She is the bravest person in Boston. “Let’s have a masquerade.”

Eight

            It is very, very late. They should be asleep in their beds, dreaming of the drudgery to come, or longing for freedom, but instead Ekundayo, Ruth, Sifiso, and Nneka are passing the cooking wine around, and taking swigs.

            Nneka takes another sip and passes the bottle to Sifiso, who swallows a mouthful before passing it on. He doesn’t wipe his mouth afterwards. It is very, very distracting. All Ekundayo wants to do is reach over and--

            “...What’s a-- a masquerade?”

            Nneka giggles at Ruth. “We do it to honor the gods, to-- to bring spirits to earth--such fun--”

            “I thought--” Ekundayo laughs, high-pitched and nearly squeaking, “I thought they were real, Abeni and Folami had to-- they had to cover my eyes--”

            “But what is it?”

            “It’s--shhh, Ayo, stop laughing in my ear! It’s dancing and singing and costumes and masks, either to honor the ancestors or the gods or both or--or anything--”

            “But don’t they-- don’t we need...you know, Aso-Oko, like Folami told me once, and--and so much cloth-- oh, and netting--“

            “I don’t see why we can’t make our own ceremony,” Sifiso says, the most clear-headed out of Ekundayo, Nneka, and Ruth. “The ancestors...they are dead and gone, they don’t care--”

            “Of course they care.” Nneka slaps Sifiso’s shoulder, and he laughs, the sound unexpectedly sweet. Ekundayo almost doesn’t hear Nneka when she whisper-yells, “They will understand, or some of them will-- you know, they’ll curse us, but most will send their love. I know my nne nne will love it, she will, she will--”

            “I think it’s a beautiful idea,” Ruth declares after taking another gulp.

She had seen the three of them planning, and she couldn’t sleep either. “I miss my sisters,” she had said, in a quiet voice, “but I-- I’m also happy to not take care of them all of the time like I used to. Judith has the worst coughs, and Liza snores the house down, and Bea always wants to do what I’m doing, and....it’s nice. To be away for a while.” She’d twisted her hands together.  “Except this is a terrible place. I hate it here, too.”

            “I think it’s a beautiful idea,” Ruth says again, and she hiccups-- “Sorry!”--and lets out another giggle.

            “You’re beautiful,” Nneka says, then slaps her hand over her mouth.

            “Really?” Ruth gasps. “You really think so?”

            Nneka tries to answer, then remembers to remove her hand. “I--yes.”

            Ruth beams, and Nneka takes a long swig.

            Sifiso meets Ekundayo’s eyes, and grins in such a lopsided and easy way that Ekundayo’s chest aches.

            He wipes his eyes and laughs and laughs, and then Sifiso joins in, honking and wheezing, and Nneka is spluttering, “Don’t you dare,” and Ruth is saying, over and over again, “I’m beautiful,” and the night is long and brilliant and full of something like hope.

           “This is shit wine,” Ekundayo declares at one point, “this is nothing like palm wine,” and he drinks it anyway.

           “Yes,” Nneka hiccups, “yes, but it’s all we have,” and he passes her the bottle.

           “What--” Nneka pauses, tapping her finger on the floor. She lifts her head up. “What...is your favorite color in the whole world?”

           “What-- ?” Sifiso almost spits out his wine.  I thought you were going to say, I dunno, ‘What do you want your last words to be,’ or--”

          “No!” Nneka shoves him. “Unlike some people, I don’t talk about mortality at all hours of the day--”

          “‘S late, I thought--”

          “Answer the question.”

           Ruth whispers to Ekundayo, “They’re so silly--”

           “...It’s pink and red,” Sifiso says when Nneka doesn’t stop tapping his cheek. “Light pink and dark red.”

           Nneka nods rapidly. “Mine’s dark green.”

           Ruth takes her head off of Ekundayo’s shoulder and says, “I’ve always loved blue.”

           Ekundayo shrugs when they all look at him. “...Violet, I s’pose.”

           “Ooh,” Nneka grins, “Someone’s been learning some fancy words.”

           “When I’m not falling asleep, you mean.”

           The bottle passes back and forth until most of it’s gone.

           It’s determined after more questioning that Nneka loves snakes and hates worms, Ruth loves cats, Sifiso doesn’t mind spiders, and Ekundayo hates dogs.

           “Wait,” Sifiso says, eyes wide, “I hate goats, too. Would eat me if they could, I swear--they’re the real original sin--”

           Ekundayo snorts. “Oh c’mon, goats are just goats--”

           “Devil creatures, you mean--”

           Ruth shakes her head: “The devil isn’t real--”

          “A goat saved my life once.”

           They all look at Nneka.

           “Really?” Nneka waves her hand. “You all really think a goat saved my life? Goats are good for meat and milk and nothing else--”

          “But a goat could,” Ekundayo interrupts, “a goat could really save your life, or someone’s life-- ‘s not impossible--”

           “It is when they’re cursed by the gods--”

           “The babies are sweet, at least--”

            It takes a while to finally leave.

            The sky is just beginning to lighten. The air grows heavier as they run out of wine.

            Nneka has to be helped up by the rest of them, Ekundayo almost trips on nothing, and Ruth keeps giggling.

            “Shh!” Nneka whisper-yells, “shhh, they’ll hear us!” but Ruth doesn’t stop, and leans against Nneka instead.

             Ekundayo wakes the next day with a pounding head, and Obi will surely punish them all, but for now, before he has to begin the day, he closes his eyes and sees Sifiso smiling, over and over again, and he hears Nneka’s laugh, and feels Ruth’s wonder, and that is worth anything to come. He wishes-- Ekundayo blinks in the piercing dawn light-- he wishes Abeni was here to tease him, that she had told some of her own stories last night, and that Folami was here to teach him the prayer to make wine-headaches go away, and to frown at his disrespect to the ancestors.

            Maybe…Ekundayo rolls over in his itchy cot, and closes his eyes for a minute longer. Maybe this masquerade will be for them, too. For his family. For Gege. For Ikenna and little Udo and Nneka’s nne and nna. For Sifiso’s ubaba. For Ruth’s mum and pa and little sisters. Maybe they are the spirits that need to be summoned to earth, and returned home.

 

Nine

            “You.”

            Ekundayo blinks. He is resting after lifting and carrying a new dresser for Eunice. Sam is sweating too, and he sags in relief when he sees that William is not talking to him, but to Ekundayo instead.

            “Sir?” Ekundayo’s voice cracks again. He winces, but William pretends not to have heard it.

            In his usual droll, the tall, blue-eyed man tells him, “I need assistance with a very. Special. Package.”

            Sam takes his cue and scampers off, wiping his face as he goes.

            Ekundayo nods as slowly as William is speaking.

            “Richard tells me that you are reliable and forthright, and that you are learning to read and write as a part of his education.”

            “Yes, sir.”

            William nods curtly. “I had suggested it, of course, but I am glad that Richard’s education is improving. He is...less distracted, and certainly enjoys instructing you.”

            Ekundayo fights down a yawn. It’s the early afternoon on a finally sunny day. The white feathers had melted days ago. “...Thank you, sir.”

            William takes a step forward. He is not a strong man, but he is an imposing one. It is his eyes, mostly, that do the trick: they are as blue as the ones Ekundayo had stabbed with a needle, before everything had gone dark, before they were all in chains.

            “I cannot trust anyone else with this task.” William shakes his head. “The servants will surely bungle it with their scheming, and other contacts of mine are, shall we say, less than truly trustworthy.” A slight smile twitches across his thin face. “Permit me to say that your people do not often have the, ah, presence of mind to complete such a vital assignment. But the Lord sends us surprises at every turn, and with your reputation for being discreet along with literate, I have chosen you above all others to carry this out.”

            Ekundayo nods, suppressing another yawn. “Thank you sir. I am...deeply honored.”

            William waves his hand. “Yes, well, on with the task. You are to help Sifiso deliver a shipment to the harbor. It is quite a large shipment, but he’s managed larger. What your task will be,” and here William stares hard at Ekundayo, “is to ensure that the shipment goes to the correct contact.” He holds out a rolled piece of parchment.

            After Ekundayo’s taken it, William starts pacing. “I need you to read the contents of that message and memorize it exactly. It contains the name of my associate, the name of the ship, details about the contents of the shipment, and other business affairs.” William stops pacing, and gives Ekundayo one long look. “Do right by me, and you shall be rewarded.”

            Ekundayo tries, but he can’t stop it-- this time, he yawns. “Apologies, sir,” he manages once he’s finished, “I shall of course complete this task as requested.”

            William nods once, and leaves without another word.

            It takes a while, but the very important package is delivered. It’s a large and heavy crate. What matters isn’t that the note reveals that William’s mysterious contact is clearly a pirate dressed in merchant attire--the Guthries have been thieves since they took their first sip of coffee, since they spooned sugar into their tea, since they purchased a slave from the auction block. What matters isn’t that the shipment contains stolen and smuggled goods, based on the notes on the contents.

            What matters is that on the carriage ride to the docks, Sifiso looks back at Ekundayo on occasion, his glances less and less wary than they were before.

            What matters is that they almost hit a finely-dressed white man who had stopped in the middle of the cobblestone street to pick up a fallen coin, and that they were both laughing as the man’s shouts faded away.

            What matters is that after the pirate takes the shipment, and after the shipment is loaded onto the ship, Sifiso wades into the water fully-clothed, the sun beaming onto sea.

            He looks back, his usual smirk returning. “What, are you afraid of water?”

            Ekundayo shakes his head quickly. “No, it’s just--I can’t swim, so--”

            Sifiso raises an eyebrow. “Come here.”

            Ekundayo holds up his hands. “No, that’s--that’s too much, we have to leave--”

            “Guthrie gave us two hours. We have at least…” Sifiso checks his pocket watch, a gift given to him by William himself. “Another hour before we are expected at the estate.” His grin widens. “Are you afraid?”

            “No,” Ekundayo says in a rush, and takes off his boots and his coat and his gloves and his scarf, and dips his feet in. The water isn’t as icy as he expected, but it’s still bitterly cold, and he almost leaps back to shore when Sifiso laughs and beckons him closer--how is he waist-deep fully-clothed and so unbothered?--so Ekundayo slowly, slowly reaches him.

            “Not so bad, is it?”

             “It’s--” Ekundayo breathes in the cool salt air, and remembers Idijola falling, falling, falling-- “It’s cold.”

              Sifiso laughs again, not hollow, not angry, not mocking, just sweet, and the sound warms Ekundayo’s whole body. “Best to learn to swim now, before it gets too cold. You never know when you’ll need to.”

             Ekundayo shakes, the cold seeping into him. “I-- I suppose? But why--this is a bit much--”

_Splash._

            Sifiso dunks him in head first.

            Ekundayo emerges--cold, so cold--coughing the sea out of his chest, spluttering, but he grew up with Abeni and Folami, and he sends a massive splash right at Sifiso’s face

            Still, Sifiso persists. “You--” he coughs-- “need--to learn. My ubaba says that to swim is to take control of your fate.”

            It doesn’t take too long--Sifiso shows him how to paddle, how to extend his arms forward and kick with his legs, how to tell when a current will sweep him away, and Ekundayo mirror the movements until he can at least cut through the water and not feel as cold anymore.

            Sifiso teaches him how to float, too.

            Ekundayo stares up at him as he lies in the waves. He shivers when Sifiso touches the small of his back, even though they’re both still clothed. He can see Sifiso’s lips turning blue.

            “We don’t...we can do this another time--”

            “No.” Sifiso shakes his head, and says through his chattering teeth, “We do this now.”

             Ekundayo looks at him for too long. Sifiso looks away.

            “Let yourself rest on top of the water.”

             Ekundayo breathes as slowly as he can. His shoulders drop, his fists unclench, his toes wiggle, and Sifiso lets go.

             Ekundayo floats, blinking the sun out of his eyes. Seagulls call overhead. This is a feeling of his dreams, of almost reaching the bush. He closes his eyes, and then--

             Sifiso flicks his nose with water. “Need to leave now.”

             Ekundayo startles, then shivers, then stands. They wade back to shore.

            “How--” Ekundayo shakes-- “what will we say when we--?”

             “I’ll handle it.”

              “...Alright.”

              “Do you doubt me?”

              “No,” Ekundayo tells him, “if I doubted you I never would have gone into the water.” He smiles at Sifiso. “Thank you. And thank you to your ubaba.”

               Sifiso rubs the back of his neck. “I...yes. You are a friend of Nneka’s. It is good for you to know.”

               “Yes.”

               “My ubaba loves the sea.” Sifiso blinks in the light. “When...a long time ago, some of the village, they...they thought I’d killed my umama. A friend of my ubaba came into our home one day with a bucket of water. My ubaba was outside tending to the evil goats, and…” Sifiso stops for a moment, the water up to his knees. “The man had grabbed my neck and--the bucket was big, his hand was thick and veined, and my whole head--it was so cold.” Sifiso shakes water out of his hair. “My ubaba taught me to swim after that.”

               “...Some people in Oyo-Ile thought I was just a spirit, and not a child.” Ekundayo shrugs. “They said I was unlucky. Sure to cause my family grief.” He smiles hard. “I suppose they’re right.”

                He can feel Sifiso looking at him, but Ekundayo doesn’t look up.

                They reach the shore sopping wet. Sifiso gets spare blankets from the carriage, and they let the sun help dry them off.

               “On the ship,” Ekundayo starts, then coughs.

                Sifiso waits.

                In the cold salty air, Ekundayo’s voice cracks. “On the ship, I had wanted...I had wanted to jump off, many times. I would go to the railing and stare down into the water. Thank you.” Ekundayo smiles, small and soft. “Now I can swim away to where I choose.”

                Sifiso scoffs. “If I were there on that slave ship with you--”

               “What, you’d teach us all to swim?” Ekundayo’s smile widens into a laugh. “You’d save me?”

               “No,” Sifiso grins, brilliant and bright, “I would have jumped with you.”

                The water laps at their feet. Ekundayo moves back and Sifiso helps him up, hand in his, still smiling, and Ekundayo thinks that the sunlit sea cannot match that.

 

Ten

                Ekundayo is sick for the next few days. Sifiso is too, but not as badly-- he has a runny nose and a sore throat, while Ekundayo has a fever, a throat that burns, and a nose so stuffed he can hardly breathe.

               “I can’t concentrate on my work,” Richard huffs, “when you’re so noisy!”

               Ekundayo coughs, coughs, coughs--his throat is tearing, surely it must be-- “I...I am sorry, sir. I won’t--”

               He sneezes so forcefully his whole body shakes.

               Ekundayo is assigned errand duties.

              “We won’t want you disturbing the whole house, would we,” Eunice says, patting his arm and smiling a little at this joke of hers.

              Joseph nods after he finishes rattling off all of the errands Ekundayo is supposed to do for the day. “You’ll be fine.” The man nearly shrugs. “You don’t need anything but fresh air. Go on, now.”

              So Ekundayo goes, eyes watering from the cold, each cough squeezing his chest.

             The citizens of Boston avoid or ignore him generally, but this time they do so with added fear and alarm-- a bone-white woman tucks her child closer to her when Ekundayo stumbles after another coughing fit, and a young paper-white man flinches when Ekundayo sneezes. A free African woman with sharp cheekbones and tribal scars he doesn’t recognize theatrically steps aside when he drags his feet through a crowded side street. Her well-made skirt sweeps past him, and through the throbbing fog in his head Ekundayo can barely discern her haughty disdain, or her earrings glittering in the faint, clouded sunlight.

             Later, he purchases squash from the local vendor the Guthries know well.

            “Here’s…” Ekundayo coughs, covering his mouth with his ruined sleeve. “Here’s for your pains.” He drops the usual amount of shillings into Miss Pearl’s waiting hand.

            Miss Pearl gingerly collects the coin, then passes him an extra handkerchief.

           “Thank--” Ekundayo sneezes into the handkerchief. “Thank you.”

            Miss Pearl views him with removed pity, not much different than how her eyes usually slide past him. “Yes, well. Your nose needs it.” Her accent is African with a tinge of British, and Ekundayo has no idea where she originated--somewhere far away from Oyo-Ile, that’s for certain. All he knows about Miss Pearl is that her deep brown eyes never quite meet anyone else’s, she keeps her hair carefully tucked away in a tight bun, her nasally voice is reedy and detached, her slim shoulders are almost always hunched, her fingers are long and her hands are calloused, and her dark skin is dotted with an occasional pimple. She is older than him-- perhaps ten seasons or so. She is well-known in the marketplace for her excellent winter and summer vegetables, and the Guthries crow to dinner guests that they knew of her brilliance before anyone else did.

            Ekundayo, for his part, respects that Miss Pearl rarely tells tall tales to convince potential customers of her products’ value, as far as he’s seen at least. The food speaks for itself. If squash could talk, they would be singing in her sturdy cart.

            He shakes his head, dabs his nose, and looks again at the beautifully ripe and round squash and other assorted items.

            Miss Pearl raises an eyebrow just slightly. “Yes? Something else you need?”

            Ekundayo startles. “No, simply--” He takes a breath. “I simply mean to say that you are a skilled farmer, and a skilled merchant.”

            Miss Pearl looks at the space between his eyes. “...Thank you. It’s not easy, but it is good work.” She shifts, and wraps her shawl more tightly around herself. “Though I must say, if you are attempting to flatter me, or-- or to court me, I will say right now that--”

            “What? Oh no, Miss Pearl, please forgive me, I meant nothing of the sort--”

            “--That I would rather live a hard life that is mine and mine alone, rather than give up my property, my earnings, and my name to any man.”

            “Yes.” Ekundayo coughs. “Of course, Miss Pearl. Please, I only spoke out of respect and admiration, nothing more.” He smiles slightly. He hopes Miss Pearl can see it. “I have no means with which to woo anyone, least of all someone as impressive as you. All I had meant to say is that my baba would want to try your squash, and-- and my iya would swap gossip with you. Like a true merchant. That is all.”

            Miss Pearl’s shoulders drop, though her frown deepens. “...Alright. Thank you for your, ah, kind words. Now if you please--” her gaze alights on a space past Ekundayo’s shoulder-- “I have customers to attend to.”

            “Of course, of course--”

            “Move it, boy.”

            Ekundayo scrambles away, not daring to look back, even though Miss Pearl is very clever, and sensible, and pretty.

            He pets the stray alleycat that he usually greets, at least, so the trip is not totally wasted.

            Still, Ekundayo returns to the Guthrie household hacking and coughing and wheezing away.

           “What-- oh come now, this is ridiculous,” Timothy declares, roughly yanking the bags of produce away from Ekundayo’s shaking hands. “We all know you’re pretending to be ill, that’s what you people do.”

           “I--” Ekundayo wipes his dripping nose with his ruined, snot-covered sleeve-- “I’m sorry--” _Fuck you--_

           “What’s going on here?”

            James, the one--Ekundayo blinks through his leaking, puffy eyes--he’s the one who had brought him here in the first place. James walks towards them, frowning and wagging a finger. “I shan’t expect any misbehaving, especially from one bought specifically, and with such care, for Richard--”

           Ekundayo sneezes all over James.

           He doesn’t remember much of what happens next--the tiredness hits him all at once. Timothy and James yell at him, probably, and James says something along the lines of, “Show your gratitude,” and Timothy spits out something like, “Disgusting.” Hands shove him, more words are said. Ekundayo is dragged down below, to the musty cellars, and a spare blanket is brought down to him.

           Through the heaviness weighing him down, Ekundayo hears Timothy, or maybe another white servant, mutter, “He’ll be of use once he’s rested; the fool, getting drenched like that, in this weather--”

           Ekundayo closes his eyes, and sinks into darkness.

           Something pokes at his side. Ekundayo moves away--sometimes, in the Smith stables, he would wake to a mouse crawling onto his straw-covered shoulder--but the poking persists.

          “Go away.”

           He’s jabbed in ribs.

          “Ow!”

           Ekundayo opens his eyes, blinking and glaring at whoever disturbed him--this is what Abeni would do to wake him up, if she-- if she was here--

           He opens his eyes to see not Nneka, or Sifiso, or even Obi. Lelise is here instead, crouching over him.

           “Food for you.”

           “...What….?”

           Lelise tsks. “I have food for you. Some bread and soup. It’s not so bad; Obi seasoned the soup for you especially. He wouldn’t let any of the other cooks touch it.”

           Ekundayo sits up slowly--the cellar floor is hard and cold--and reaches for the small tray of food.

           Lelise pulls it away from him, just out of reach. “They didn’t make me come down here, you know.” She smiles, and her eyes never leave his face. “I volunteered.”

           Ekundayo blinks and cracks his neck so some of the haziness leaves his head. “What--” he coughs-- “do you want?” He feels less like he’s melting, but he still has to wipe his nose every few seconds.

           Lelise’s smile grows wider and wider, and Ekundayo has to look away. “I want to know what you’re planning with Nneka, Sifiso, and Ruth.”

          “No. No, I’m not telling you--how did you find out about that--?”

          “I have my sources.” Lelise leans closer. “If you don’t tell me, I will eat this soup and this bread right now. Every bite, all for me.”

          Ekundayo scrambles towards the tray, and she pushes it farther away.

          Her smile never wavers. “Tell me.”

          Ekundayo sneezes. His nose feels like it has been clogged with hard-packed dirt shovelled by ants who hate him. He looks at Lelise’s slightly crooked teeth, and takes a harsh, slow breath in. “I won’t tell you anything until you tell me why you spread rumors about Nneka and Albert Guthrie, when she’d first arrived.” His gaze moves to hers. “I want to know what lies you tell yourself.”

          Lelise opens her mouth, then closes it. The silence is damp and musty.

          Ekundayo laughs. “You think I haven’t gone without food before? I can wait.” He shifts so he’s leaning against a massive wooden barrel, and closes his eyes.

          He wills himself not to cough. Air rattles through his chest.  His hand brushes against a cobweb on the floor, and he shakes it off.

          Lelise’s voice is not as nasally as Miss Pearl’s, or as fast and bright as Nneka’s. It is conspiratorial and dramatic, pitching high and low, loud and soft, as often as it needs to. Here, now, she is  quieter than she usually is, though no less determined to wrest the silence from him. “I don’t know.” She shakes her head. “I don’t know why I did it. It was a long time ago.”

         “Yes you do. You know.”

         “No, I--”

         “Tell me.”

           Another long pause. Ekundayo wipes his nose, coughs, sneezes, wipes his nose, coughs. Reviews the items they’re gathering for the masquerade: spare blankets, old robes from Ruth’s sisters that they’ll hardly miss, that they can no longer fit into anyway, rope from a dock worker Sifiso is friendly with, beads from Penelope who Nneka is close to, pots and pans Obi would potentially let them use if they compliment him enough--

          “...Once,” Lelise nearly whispers, “there was a girl everyone teased. She was small and skinny. She had no brothers and sisters. No aabba or haadha either.” Lelise sits on the cold floor, the tray of bread and soup right in front of her. “Some say she lived in the bush like a wild animal. Some say she stole into people’s houses and slept there, like a stray cat. Some say she did have family, but no one wanted to claim her on account of her bad manners, her rags for clothes, her skinny elbows, her too-big front teeth, and, most of all, her silence. She rarely spoke at all to anyone.” Lelise shrugs. “People would ask, ‘Where are you from?’ She would say nothing. Farmers would say, ‘Work in our fields, I have payment,’ and she would say nothing. Priests, merchants, soldiers, old women who needed their clothes washed...they would all ask the girl, ‘Help us, we will give you food, we will give you a warm bed, we will give you anything you want,’ and still, she said nothing. Finally,” Lelise says, then pauses. She closes her eyes, then opens them. “Finally, one day, the girl left. She walked through the gates of our city, and she never came back. Some say she was eaten by a wolf. Some say she was a spirit, and that one day she would return and cast a curse upon us all.” Lelise shrugs and picks at her nails. “Her name was Lelise.”

            Ekundayo blinks. “What--?”

            “Or at least, that’s what everyone called her. She was always looking at our things. My family was very worried that she would steal from us, so I chased her away from our house many times. It was easy to do. I called her dirty and stinky like everyone else. It was easy to do. Everyone called me beautiful and strong. Everyone listened to me. All of my friends looked at me as if they were small and I was big.” Lelise looks at Ekundayo then, and an unreadable look slides across her face. “My aabba and haadha gave me a beautiful name. A strong name. A name the ancestors would smile at. A name made of coins and promise.” Lelise picks, picks, picks at her nails. “Marching on the road, I was hungry. In the ship, I was skinny and stinky. In Boston, I was no one from nowhere. James asked who I was, when I first arrived, and I-- I said Lelise without thinking.” The beautiful, clever girl stares at Ekundayo, and he has never seen her eyes look so empty. “With Nneka....it was easy. All I had to do was speak, and people-- people finally listened.”

             Lelise smiles. In the silence that follows, Ekundayo says, “You’re crazy.” Then: “We’re putting on a masquerade.”

             Lelise’s eyes gleam in the damp dark. “Can I--?”

             “You can tell everyone that Albert Guthrie is a monster. You can say that you think the house is possessed by spirits. You can say that something is waiting to strike.” Ekundayo glares up at her. “If you speak one word about our plans to anyone else, Nneka will kill you, and I will tell everyone you died by farting so loudly you scared yourself to death.”

             Lelise raises an eyebrow. “I won’t tell anyone.”

            “How can I trust that, when you spread whatever lies you want?”

             “I want to see what happens.” Lelise grins. “And I want to see Albert’s face. He’s so ugly and ill-mannered: my haadha would mock him out of the kingdom.” She adds, “I help the Guthries when it helps me, that’s all.” When Ekundayo gives her a look, Lelise huffs, “Listen, I’ll help you because I’m curious. And it will help me have fewer enemies: The Guthries won’t suspect me of anything and Nneka won’t want me dead. Good enough?”

             “...Good enough.”

             “Well, I have other duties to attend to. I’ll be sure to get the whole house in a fright.” Lelise’s slight smirk is back in place, and she strides out of the room with her head held high, her gait impertinent and regal, snotty and majestic. It’s like she owns the whole house. It’s like she goes by a different name.  

              Ekundayo watches her go, and he almost forgets about the bread and the soup. When he does eat, the soup is so spicy it burns his eyes.

             “Did you like it?” Obi asks later, when Ekundayo’s emerged from the cellar, still sick but put to work anyway in the kitchens.

             “...Yes,” Ekundayo says, “It...it helped,” and he hears Nneka snort next to him. She nudges his shoulder, and after dinner, she gives him some tea to soothe his throat.

             Richard wants him to sleep outside of his room again: “I don’t want sleep next to so much coughing and hacking.”

             Ekundayo’s back is sore, pressing against the wall, and his neck hurts, and his legs and arms are stiff, and he spends half the night coughing and wiping his nose. He dreams of smoke filling his lungs, that his head is made of sticks.

             In the morning, Ekundayo wakes to a hand pressing gently against his forehead. A low, familiar voice whispers into his ear, “You’re the most foolish person I’ve ever met.”

             Ekundayo opens his eyes. He realizes, blinking at the filled teacup in front of him, that he’s woken up smiling.

 

Eleven

            _The Iliad_ is largely dense and ridiculous, and Ekundayo barely absorbs any of it beyond what he needs to to slog through Peters’ questioning. There is, however, one passage that repeats in his head as they prepare for Albert Guthrie’s imminent arrival, and for the masquerade.

            It repeats in his head when Obi finally relents for them to use some of his pots and pans. “I expect that when you are punished--and you will be punished--that nothing comes back to me.”

            “Of course,” Ekundayo nods, startled out of his head. “Of course, Obi. Thank you.”

            “I hope, at least, that Albert’s wandering eye gets scorched.”

            “I--” Ekundayo lets out a startled laugh. “Yes.”

            Obi nods once. “Good.”

            It repeats when he overhears Lelise and the servant Penelope talking as they mend some clothes of a few of the Guthries’ higher-ranking employees.

            “...C’mon, Penelope, you have to admit that you’ve heard some strange noises lately, especially at night. And Sifiso-- he’s gotten even more ghoulish during his performances, wouldn’t you agree?”

            Ekundayo, right outside the entrance to the parlor, hears a snort, and then: “First, for the hundredth bloody time, you can call me Penny, everybody does. Second, I know when you’re trying to stir up trouble. What’re you planning?”

            “I’m being completely serious!” There’s a pause, then a slight curse at some sort of accident with a needle. “The house doesn’t feel the same. And I’ve been having these dreams-- these awful, awful dreams--tell Jane about them, will you? She can give me something for the horrid nights.”

            “‘Horrid nights?’ That’s a bit much, even for you.” Then, softer: “What are you planning?”

            “...I...” Ekundayo holds his breath. Lelise mumbles, “I...I can’t say.”

            “Lelise.” Penelope’s voice turns so firm that Ekundayo stands up straighter against the wall. “Tell me.”

            “I can’t.” This is the first time Ekundayo’s ever heard Lelise sound remotely nervous, and that’s when he breathes again. Her voice isn’t honeyed or overly teary. It’s stuttering, unsure. “I promised--I had made a promise, it’s a surprise, I can’t-- I can’t tell anybody. Not…” A little nervous giggle titters into the air. “Not even you.”

            “...Are you going to hurt anyone with this?” There’s the shifting of fabric. “Well?” There’s a slight pause. Then Penelope says, quiet and steady, “Look at me.”

            “...I’m…” Lelise coughs slightly. “No, I’m not. Not this time. I swear it.”

            A laugh. “Alright.”

            “...Alright?”

            “Look,” Penelope laughs again, “I’m not going to ask you to make a blood oath. If anyone gets hurt because of your rumor-spreading, I’ll know.” There’s something biting underneath the smile in her voice. “Of course, lies and gossip aren’t always bad.”

            “...No. Not always.”

            “Yes, well, that’s something we can agree on. Just don’t--don’t hurt anyone this time. Please.”

            Another pause. Then: “I won’t.”

            “Good. Now I absolutely need to tell you about the kittens I saw today on the way to the cobbler’s--”

            Ekundayo sneaks away, Lelise’s light laugh snagging in his ears, and as he rounds the corner to get away from the parlor, that little _Iliad_ phrase echoes in his head again.

            He hears it when he’s sweeping the floors with Nneka, and she’s chattering even more than usual, because she is nervous, because Albert is coming home in two days, because the masquerade is approaching and they are not as remotely prepared as they would like to be.

            “--and we don’t even have the proper dyes for the clothes--this is going to be a disaster, the gods will curse us forever--”

            “We’ll be fine!”

            Nneka sweeps dust so forcefully some of it shoots up her nose, and after sneezing she manages, “No we won’t! Why did I think this was a good idea? We might-- we might be sold to someone else, we might all be separated, and the gods will hate me, and--”

            “Nneka.” Ekundayo sweeps up a stray crumb, and turns back to look at his friend. “Sifiso asked, and Mr. Guthrie said that it would be wonderful for him to perform for Alfred upon his return. You know this. You know that the Guthries want Sifiso to put on a show. They want something spectacular, and we’ll give it to them.” When Nneka opens her mouth, Ekundayo adds, “And the gods won’t curse us. The ancestors won’t either. This isn’t a real masquerade--we don’t have any Aso-Oke, we don’t know the songs and chants...it’s not real, but it’s ours.”

            “...Yes. Yes, it’s ours.” Nneka’s smile wobbles. “It’s--it’s mine.”

            “Of course.”

            Nneka takes a deep breath, picks up her broom, and gets back to sweeping. They chat about the changes being made to Joseph’s study, about a new recipe Obi’s been testing, about Timothy falling in a pile of horse shit in the middle of the street, or so Ruth told them, who heard it from the nurse Jane, who heard it from Jim, who heard it from Lelise. Nneka rambles on about how Ruth is making some embroidery for “someone special,” and how Nneka doesn’t know who that is, but they better be someone special enough for Ruth--

            The line repeats most incessantly when Ekundayo is trying very hard not to think about how important the next few days are going to be, and then he glimpses Sifiso walking out the front door. Ekundayo feels more nervous and more calm, looking at him, and he watches Sifiso leave, his broad shoulders filling the door frame, until the door is closed. He must’ve stopped in for a short time; Ekundayo hasn’t seen him much lately, he’s always down by the docks.

            The line repeats again. Ekundayo shakes his head, but it doesn’t leave him:

            _“Then up he takes his helmet and departs,_

_And homewards she; but often turn’d her head._

_At home with grief she fill’d her women’s hearts,_

_And made them mourn for Hector not yet dead.”_

            At night, he touches the scars under his wrist, and he dreams his baba’s laugh, Bolanle and Monifa’s cackle-whispers, Abeni punching his shoulder, Folami muttering prayers under breath. His iya’s hands holding him close, like he is small again.

            He wakes up in the dark.

            Ekundayo wants them here. Or--or he wants to be home. He is tired of dreaming his family. Maybe...he yawns and rolls over in his cot. Maybe he will see them in the masquerade. He is tired of turning his head.

            _Please, Esu._

He goes back to sleep, and doesn’t dream of anything else.

Twelve

            When Albert Guthrie arrives, the whole house holds its breath.

            Eunice embraces her elder son’s tall frame, patting his cheek and saying, “Welcome home, my boy.”

            Joseph claps the young man on the shoulder, a satisfied smile beaming across his face, a rare sight for anyone to see. “Come in, Al, come in--someone take his things--”

            Richard, hearing the commotion, stands up from his chair at the library. “We’ll continue the lesson later,” he says hurriedly, not even looking at Ekundayo as he gathers his things and shuts Homer closed. Ekundayo follows the boy a few moments later.

            He watches in the gaps of a small crowd as Albert Guthrie ruffles his brother’s hair. Ekundayo doesn’t see much of the man himself, just a large hand patting Richard’s head.

            “Dicky! You’re growing big,” a deep voice laughs, light and cheerful.

            Ekundayo glimpses Richard’s smile through the gathering crowd of staff, servants, and slaves. “You’re getting smaller.”

            The Guthrie family is back together again.

            Out of the corner of his eye, Ekundayo glimpses Ruth walking away with Nneka, their heads bent close together as they turn the corner.

            The plan is in motion.

            _Help me, Esu. Help us all._

He pushes through the small crowd-- “Watch it,” Timothy hisses, and Jane the nurse gives him a curious glance--Obi raises an eyebrow--

            “And who’s this?”

            Ekundayo keeps his head down and takes all four of Albert’s bags, two in each hand. One is heavier and bulkier than the others, but--Ekundayo grits his teeth--he can do this. He lifts them up and prepares to leave, but--

            “Oh, this is Mr. Scott. He’s a good helper, brought him here all the way over from Kingston.” Richard moves his hand as if to pat the top of his head.

             Ekundayo ducks into a bow. Richard moves his hand away.

             After a slight pause, Ekundayo says, “If I may, sir.”

            “Of course.” Ekundayo hears the jolly laughter in Albert’s voice. “What a useful boy to have around, Dick. Of course, the rest of my things will be arriving over the next few days, but it’s good to know someone so eager is here to assist first thing.”

            Ekundayo feels Albert’s gaze fix on him. He keeps his head down even as his neck hurts, and his arms are a little strained from holding all of the bags. If Ekundayo looks up, Albert Guthrie will see the hatred in his eyes, and it will all be over.

            He bobs his head one more time and moves away in the direction of Albert’s room-- “He’s a quiet one, isn’t he?”-- and he doesn’t look back.

           “Pardon me, do you need help?”

            Ekundayo shakes his head and ignores James.

           “Wait to unpack his things until Tim gets there,” a servant--Luke, perhaps?--calls after him. Ekundayo nods and keeps moving, rounds another corner, walks down the corridor, opens the room he’s never been in until now--

           “Good,” Ruth says, “You’re here.”

            Ekundayo drops the bags and closes the door behind him. He presses his ear against the door, and taps twice.

            Two taps from outside the room answer his.

           “Is she there?”

            Ekundayo turns to Nneka. “She’s outside. Lelise is standing guard; looks like the coins we gathered did some good.”

            Nneka raises her eyebrows, then shrugs. “Good. If she betrays us...you know the back-up plan.” She lifts the bags onto the bed.

            Ruth keeps tapping her foot. “Shouldn’t we wait for Sifiso--?”

            “Plan’s changed,” Nneka says over her shoulder as she opens the heaviest bag. “Sifiso’s at work on the docks--apparently Guthrie wants his performance to be a big surprise tonight, so Sifiso’s out for the day.” Nneka starts going through the contents. “There’s no time. We move now.”

            “Alright.” Ruth walks over to her with eyes like flint. “Let’s get started.”

            Ekundayo moves away from the door, heart pounding in his ears. He turns to Nneka and Ruth. “Happy All Hallow’s Eve.”

Together, the three of them set the masquerade in motion.

Thirteen

            It’s a cold and cloudless evening. The sun is just beginning to fade from the dark sky.

            A lavish meal is served--Obi has been preparing all day, getting the whole kitchen into a bit of a frenzy. Ekundayo and Nneka avoid him to set the table, carefully placing the silverware and napkins on the tablecloth.

            “The Guthries hate All Hallow’s Eve,” Nneka says idly as she sets a glass down. “Goes against their God and such.”

            Ekundayo nods, adjusting a knife so it isn’t crooked. “Didn’t you hear Eunice going on about it at one of her meetings? Her friends all said it was the devil’s work.”

            “Oh right. I was distracted by the booger in Eunice’s nose.” Nneka snickers, then adds, “I don’t know if her God will be pleased with us, but her devil might be.”

            Ekundayo laughs as he puts down another set of silverware. “Let’s hope so.”

            The table is set.

            The meal is ready.

            The Guthries come to dinner.

            A few guests are visiting as well--some old friends of Albert’s and their families. It’s a crowded table, filled with the clinking of wine glasses, the trading of gossip and news, and cheers for Albert’s safe return.

            “Remember when you drew Mr. Jennings with that big mustache?”

            Albert laughs long and loud. “Of course, Ben--I still remember the face he made when he found it!”

            Ben, apparently, chortles along with his old mate. “You were always a top artist, Al.”

            “Oh c’mon, I’m hardly Michelangelo--”

            “No, I do believe you’re on par with him,” another friend pipes up, stout and merry. “No one can capture the human form like you can.”

            “Well,” Albert smiles, eyes wine-bright, “If you say so.”

            Ekundayo serves the stout friend more wine. Nneka helps serve the roast beef. Lelise clears the empty plates and brings fresh ones. Other servants and slaves bustle between the kitchen and the table. Sometimes they receive a nod of acknowledgement, or a brief, “Thank you,” from someone, likely Eunice, but the most interesting conversation they have is silent and between themselves. A servant named Francine exchanges smiles with another servant called Liza when Richard almost chokes on his wine, and the twin slaves, Victor and Veronica, muffle laughter when Eunice accidentally flings a piece of roast beef off of her plate with her fork.

            Of course, the most important conversation that happens is when everyone at the table has had a proper drink, when they are stuffed full, and when Joseph announces, “Now for some entertainment!”

            Nneka and Ekundayo glance at each other from across the table. They are standing by should anyone request their service, as is proper. Now, though, they lock eyes and nod. Nneka goes first, slipping away as Albert asks, “Will Sifiso head the proceedings? I’ve missed his antics while I’ve been abroad.”

            “Yes,” Joseph laughs, “the scoundrel will be putting on a show in your honor.”

            Albert nods, sipping more wine, smile bright and expectant and content with everything as it should be. “Excellent.”

            Ekundayo moves then. Soon he is in the kitchen, where others are getting ready to leave to prepare for Sifiso. Nneka is whispering something to Ruth, who’s nodding rapidly.

“Is he here yet?”

            Nneka startles. “Not yet, Ayo. Should be here soon.”

            Ruth fidgets with her sleeve. “If everything goes wrong...I’ll stick with you three no matter what happens.”

            Nneka looks at her, and she has to wipe her eyes. “Thank you.”

            Ekundayo swallows. “If we...if something happens, I...I need you to know that--”

_Thunk._

             Muffled cursing.

            “He’s here.” Nneka’s already moving to the back entrance to the kitchen, Ruth close behind.

             Joseph’s voice echoes from the table: “You all know the story, but since some of us have been away for so long, I thought the tale might need repeating: In the wild jungles of Africa, there was a beast who devoured the souls of the poor inhabitants…”

             Ruth, Nneka, and Ekundayo help Sifiso carry everything into the kitchen. Ruth and Ekundyo wrap the white and blue cloth around themselves. It’s old tablecloth that some maids were going to throw away before Nneka intervened in time.

             Ekundayo wraps the fabric around him, remembering the burial of his iya-nla, and how she had been wrapped in the sacred blue and white burial cloth of the dead. He closes his eyes, and he reaches his fingers out to touch the mounds of earth where his sister and brother lie still--

            “We need to hurry,” Ruth whispers, “Joseph’s almost halfway through.”

             The other layers are hurriedly applied--the necklaces of farthings and shillings they scrounged around for that will serve as their protective amulets in the inner layer of the costume, and, of course, the many strips of multi-colored cloth and fabrics. Some of it is from Ruth’s sisters, some from old clothes that don’t fit Nneka and Sifiso anymore, some from other slaves and servants who happily gave them away--the colors are white, gray, brown, and black, with occasional splashes of color. The cloth and fabrics are stained with dirt and food and work. These are not clothes worn by the rich. This is not a real masquerade. Women are not supposed to wear the costumes, and there Ruth is, preparing to put the netting over her face. After muttered curses and fumbling hands, Ekundayo and Ruth finish putting on the costume, and they move slightly to get a feel for the how their bodies move now. Pieces of rope have been attached to the end of the outer layers of fabric to serve as the lappets, and glittering farthings and beads are attached to stripes of outer cloth to catch the light.

             The cloth is not nearly as colorful or expensive as it should be. They have no Aso-Oke, and they don’t know the sacred chants and songs and dances. Sifiso has never even seen a masquerade before--they don’t have them in his village, and Ruth has only heard distant stories from friends of her family.

             Still. Ekundayo breaths in, breaths out. He likes how he can see all of them, and no one can see him. Him and Ruth are encased, enveloped. They are unrecognizable. They are not themselves.

             Sifiso finishes buttoning his own costume, and Nneka readies herself, eyes bright, jaw set.

             “...and now, we have a very special performance tonight, from the savage spirit now tamed--”

_Clang._

Nneka hits a large iron pot with a wooden spoon.

`           The table outside titters.

            Nneka hits the pot again and again and again, without rhythm, and Sifiso squares his shoulders, and Ekundayo and Ruth walk towards the entrance to the kitchens--

            _Boom clang boom boom clang boom clang clang boom clang--_

Nneka’s stomps fade as Ekundayo, Ruth, and Sifiso leave the kitchen, but her voice carries and sings in their ears as she chants and yells:

            “Anyi no ebe a!”

            Sifiso leads the two of them in his own costume, shoulders back, head held high. He swaggers into the dining room, Ruth and Ekundayo behind him.

            Eyes fall on them.

            “What--what’s happening--?”

            “Oh, what a….what a surprise--”

            “Splendid!”

            “What are they--more spirits from the jungle--?”

            Sifiso laughs, light and cheerful. He strides onto the cleared table, adjusts his cravat, and smiles indulgently. “Come now, I’m no spirit. You know exactly who I am.”

            Silence.

            In a perfect imitation of Albert Guthrie, Sifiso continues, “I’m here to tell you a little more about myself,” and slowly, slowly, he takes papers out of his pockets. Well. They aren’t his pockets.

            Sifiso pulls papers out of Albert Guthrie’s coat.

            Nneka’s voice rings out amongst the beat of the pots and pans: “Anyi no ebe a!”

            “What--?” Albert Guthrie laughs, the sound high and warbling. “What is this?”

             Ekundayo and Ruth sway together. Ruth almost knocks Ben’s glass before stepping away just in time, and Ekundayo almost trips on his robes. But then-- but then they twirl across the table--the pots and pans clang in their ears, and Nneka’s voice is in their bones, and Sifiso is clearing his throat, and together, Ekundayo and Ruth dance right up to Albert Guthrie’s widened eyes.

            They stop. They’re still. Albert is looking at them and them alone. He doesn’t see Sifiso leafing through the papers and preparing to speak.

             Ekundayo is breathing hard--it’s hot underneath all of the layers--but he doesn’t notice, not anymore. He doesn’t care about the sweat under his arms, or how fast his heart is beating. None of that matters now. He meets everyone’s eyes as they look up at him and Ruth, as their gazes stick to them, as Richard surely looks around for his favorite helper. Ekundayo closes his eyes.

            “Anyi no ebe a!”

_Boom clang clang boom clang boom boom clang boom clang--_

             “Here is a story,” Sifiso says in Albert Guthrie’s voice, “of an artist. He is terribly talented, but something...well. Something went horribly wrong. Let me show you--”

_Boom boom clang boom clang clang boom clang boom boom--_

             Ekundayo opens his eyes.

             For a moment, everything is silent. Everything is still.

            He is not on the table.

            He is not in the Guthrie household.

            He is not in Boston, he is not in Kingston, he is not on the ship.

            Ekundayo blinks, closes his eyes, opens them. His fingers touch tall grasses. He is clothed simply. The air is cool, the stars are bright, the insects sing, and the moon shines on everything.

            The bush sways in the slight breeze.

            Ekundayo breathes in the deep blue night, and begins to walk.

Thirteen

             It is never quiet in the bush. There are insects singing and buzzing to each other, and beasts rustling in the undergrowth, growls low in their red throats. But more than that, there is the constant sway of the grasses in the wind:

_“You are home.”_

             Their voices are as soft as the moonlight gleaming on his back, and just as eerie.

_“Welcome.”_

_“Stay. Don’t leave this time.”_

_“We are so happy to have you here again.”_

_“So happy.”_

_“So happy.”_

_“So happy.”_

_“So happy--”_

              Ekundayo walks. There are no pathways for him to follow, no clearing to cut through. His footsteps are wandering and uncertain. Impermanent. There are no traces of him to leave behind. Ekundayo looks behind himself, once, and sees the same tall grasses, hears the whispers again and again:

_“You are home.”_

              He isn’t even sure if he’s walking; his feet touch the ground, and he feels insects and grass and the cool night air against his skin, but at other points he feels as though he is floating, as though he’s never had a human body to begin with. That he is the wind winding its way through the bush.

              Ekundayo shakes his head and slaps a mosquito off of his elbow, even though it had not bitten him. The whispers don’t stop--the bush is never quiet--but he feels the soft ground beneath his feet again.

              He journeys on.

              Ekundayo is not hungry or thirsty-- he doesn’t have to relieve himself, or wipe sweat off of his brow, or scratch a random itch. The moon floats in the deep blue sky just as it had in the beginning. There is no hint of sun, but that hardly matters, since Ekundayo is so deep in the bush anyway. The dark is no trouble for him.

_“It is so good to see you again.”_

_“We weep with joy at your homecoming.”_

_“Listen--we are singing for you, for you!”_

_“We are so happy.”_

_“So happy.”_

_“So happy.”_

_“So happy.”_

_“So happy.”_

_“So happy--”_

              Tortoise looks up from his meal. His smile is wide. “Good, good, perfect. You can fetch me more agbalumo.” Tortoise’s eyes glitter. There is barely any light to see his large, round form, and yet if Ekunday crept closer, if Ekundayo looked hard enough, he would see each and every star in those eyes.

              “Come,” Tortoise laughs, starlit eyes crinkling as his mouth stretches wider into a grin. “Fetch me more star apples. I will give you cowry shells. I will give you palm wine. I will--”

              “Ajapa, I am sorry, but I must be going.” Ekundayo bows his head to Tortoise and walks. He blinks: he hadn’t even noticed he’d stopped walking.

              “Foolish child!” Tortoise’s deep voice rumbles through air and shakes the ground. Ekundayo loses his footing. “You dare disrespect your elder? You dare abandon those in need?”

               Ekundayo turns his head, just once. Tortoise is glaring at him, nostrils flared, claws digging into the earth. For a moment, Ekundayo pictures himself gathering the agbalumo, of biting into its sweet flesh, of sipping palm wine and spending cowry shells on whatever trinket he desires--

              “Ajapa,” Ekundayo says, and bows his head again. “You are not helpless. You are not to be trusted.” He smiles slightly. “I know the stories. I know what you did to those children.”

              Tortoise’s rumbling ceases, and Ekundayo turns his head back to the grasses in front of him.

              There is almost silence.

              Then: a soft thump.

              Ekundayo does not turn his head; he knows Ajapa’s is lying on the ground.

              Stars flit across the sky. Something growls low in the distance. The earth is heady and rain-scented, though there are no clouds in the sky. Ekundayo does not feel tired, or hungry, or thirsty, but he is beginning to wonder where his feet are taking him. If he is even supposed to be traveling in this form. If he should simply leave this body and fly away. Soon, though, ash coats his lungs, and Ekundayo is too busy coughing to think about anything else.

             There is smoke stinging his eyes and faint embers burning his feet, but Ekundayo doesn’t stop walking, just stumbles his way through the wreckage. He is walking through the ruins of a massive structure. Faint wails, pleas, hisses of rage, high laughs cling to his ears. And then, a clap of thunder in the distance. A flash of lighting across the cloudless sky.

              Ekundayo stills, and breathes in the ash of the dead. Closes his eyes. Thinks of Ajaka, quiet and afraid and weak. Thinks of Sango, angry and fierce and hanging in a tree. Thinks of everyone they have lost, everyone who has died for their kings.

              Ekundayo opens his eyes. The sky is clear. The smoke is gone. Still, he makes sure not to step on any of the bones. He is very careful: he does not brush against any of the spirits, either.

              It’s some time before he stops again.

              Eventually, Ekundayo looks down at his feet and sees that his feet are now the bony, almost scaly feet of a rooster’s. Ekundayo does not have time to ponder more about any of this--why are the grasses suddenly so tall, why does he have feathers--because a large hand scoops him up.

              Ekundayo tries to yell, but all that comes out of his throat is a loud squawk, and that sound is swallowed by the air, and he is being lifted up, and he can see everything--he can see past the bush, he can see the moon’s craters, he can reach a star, and he is shaking all over--there are feathers everywhere, drifting to the ground like wild gusts of dust, and Ekundayo closes his eyes right before he is swallowed.

              Down, down, down he goes, bones crunching, feathers dissolving. There is dark everywhere, all over everything, neverending, he is falling, falling, falling--

              A sound, deep and reverberating all around him, in his bones, pumping his frantic bird-heart. It is a sound beyond language, a voice from everywhere at once. The meaning of it is manifold and winding, but Ekundayo hears the voice as a greeting, a hungry grin, and as the shade in his favorite part of his family’s house. Ekundayo is not afraid: he knows this place. He performs the familiar ritual, whistling to his left and right, speaking the summoning words, and, eventually, he sings a prayer. He is not a rooster anymore, but he isn’t a human being, either. He is formless and floating, an abiku who has yet to find an iya’s child-shell to steal.

             Ekundayo’s voice comes from no mouth, no throat, no body, but he sings just the same. The sound is clear and bright and something like birdsong. The sound is like a bell scattering stars across the black expanse with every ring.

             In the belly of his god, Ekundayo prays:

             “ _Esu akuo Onibode Baba mi dacomo omo_ ,

_dacomo afefa Okwede mefa, okwede ilu,_

_Azoran yama cotiti cocori hiya.”_

              Nothing is quiet or still; everything is shifting in this place, and Ekundayo senses endless corridors, pathways, trails, and roads reaching out to him, leading him somewhere unknown. Ekundayo stays where he is, the prayer echoing through him.

              Time passes, and then a laugh shakes the dark.

               In Yoruba, Esu answers the prayer: “ _Hello, little one.”_

               The abiku called Ekundayo asks, “ _Am I home?”_

               Esu laughs again.  _“Are you?”_

 _...Am I?_ The abiku shivers. It is trembling and lost--everything is half-formed and unmade here, everything is change-- and soon the abiku is flying and crawling and scrambling for footing. It climbs up the walls of Esu’s stomach, out of the long column Esu’s throat, and slips in between his gleaming teeth. It is a long and strange journey--there is no straight path to follow, and the abiku does not know how long it takes, but it also does not care. It just wants to be home.

               The moon is the same. The sky is the same. The tall grasses sway the same, and the wind whispers the same greetings.

               The abiku hears Esu again, and the voice this time is a call from deep within the earth. And so the abiku burrows through the dirt, past the roots, past the crawling insects, past the decaying flesh of the dead--the abiku is hungry, it has no cowries, nothing except the earth to dig through, nothing but the voice to follow--

_Thunk._

                The abiku slams against solid wood.  _What--?_

                It scrambles about, trying to find an opening to squeeze through, but nothing gives way. It hears Esu’s voice again, from down below, and the abiku tries to call back, but no sound comes out. There is nothing here now, except the wood that would not break.

                Everything is quiet. Everything is still. The abiku cannot scream, but it opens its void of a mouth wide, and it hopes that Esu will accept its apology. It is so hungry and hollow and alone. It has always been like this. It will always be like this.

                The abiku cries. Its silver tears drip against the wood, and the abiku lifts a shaking hand and knocks. It is a muffled sound. A weak sound. Still, anything is better than this terrible silence. Than choking on dirt.

                The door opens. The abiku falls through it.

                There is a child here in this grave. A girl, days old.

                The abiku knows this shape. This was its first home, after it had left its egba, after it had travelled down one of Esu’s roads all that time ago.

                The girl lies still and quiet in the dark. The abiku curls up next to her. Her face is smaller than it remembered. It breathes against her skin, and the girl does not stir, but the abiku remembers her laugh--its own laugh and hers, together--and it closes its eyes for a moment.

                The abiku opens its eyes. The girl, of course, does not. 

                Before it had left her body behind, the abiku had laughed and laughed, giddy with its earnings, with its cowries, with the knowledge that it had made others joyful, if only for a short time. It had laughed as it had left her too. It had not looked back.

                This time, the abiku kisses the girl’s soft, smooth forehead before it leaves.

                The grave opens, and the abiku climbs out and digs down through the earth.

                The abiku falls against another doorway, and this time the abiku knocks without hesitation. The abiku blinks in the tight space, then smiles. Yes. Here is its second home.

                The boy is even smaller than the girl. He had never breathed in the air of that other world, not once. The abiku cradles the boy in its arms. He is light--too light, too small, too quiet--he was never going to be a lasting home. The abiku had been restless, fidgety, impatient, hungry, greedy for cowries. It had left as soon as the boy had been birthed, and it didn’t look back that time either. It had just clutched its cowries in its hands, grin stretched wide across its face.

                The abiku gently lays the boy down. He is too small. Too quiet. There had been so much blood.

                The abiku kisses the boy’s cheek, opens the door, and leaves its second home behind.

                 As it crawls and digs and flies through the earth, the abiku’s hunger sharpens, its restlessness makes it twitch, and its hands grasp for cowries, but it also thinks of questions:

_Why do I return to the same iya, to the same family? More cowries, yes, but there is another reason--_

_How did I leave? How did I escape unseen?_

_Have I ever had a home?_

_Will I ever find my way back--back to--_

_Why didn’t she mark me, like other abiku children? Why didn’t she notch my ears? What had the Babalawo seen, when he had found me? What had he said to trap me? Why--_ the abiku squeezes its eyes shut as it falls faster and further down-- _Why had I stayed?_

                 Eventually the abiku slams against a third door. It is simple but well-made, solid wood and painted a light blue. It does not break, of course, but the abiku thinks...it presses against the door, and it hears voices beyond the door.

                 Esu’s voice rumbles in its ear:  _“Well?”_

                The abiku pauses, but only just. After all, what other path is there to take--?

_Oh._

               Above, an opening to the moonlit sky. Behind, countless pathways through the earth. A door, small and unassuming, to the left, and another door, wide and ornate, to the right. Crossroads and doorways, tangled pathways and roads leading everywhere.

              The abiku shakes its head. Esu will not be pleased if it chooses the wrong path. If it opens the wrong door...Esu will surely unleash a punishment waiting for it. It had not travelled any other pathway but this one. Surely it must open the door in front of it.

              Still. The abiku stills. The iya had never bound her children with names to keep the abiku tethered to the earth. Enitan had not named her children after pleas, or oaths, or any other title that traps an abiku in its shell of a human body.

              The abiku is free. It is untethered. The Babalawo’s words from long ago cannot keep it here any longer. Why would it ever willingly return to the chains of that limiting form? Why would it go back to a body whose name is not a prison, but a doorway out?

              And yet--

              And yet--

              Enitan had named her child after a promise. The name is a proclamation, a prediction that desperately wanted to be true. The name did not keep the abiku held in that body, but something else did. Something else still did.

              Is the abiku a real abiku if it has lived inside a human body for years, if it never left its child-shell? What is it now, if not what it once was? Is it a spirit? A person? One of Esu’s children? Some poor desperate thing, caught between forms, belonging nowhere?

              The voices beyond the door grow louder. Maybe the abiku is simply curious. Maybe that is why it has stayed for so long. It wants to know who is speaking, and what is being said. It wants to know more of the story.

_Which would you choose, the rich baba who claimed him, or the poor baba who left him?_

_Which would you choose?_

             The abiku is not an abiku any longer. It is something else.

             The abiku knocks on one of Esu’s doors. It swings open, and after a long moment, Ekundayo steps inside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> more to come!! this is by no means the end of PART IV. 
> 
> also these poems are really, really relevant for this part if you'd like to check 'em out: https://www.poeticous.com/maya-angelou/the-mask-we-wear-the-mask-that-grins-and-lies
> 
> also according to an admittedly kind of sketchy site, "Wena ma-inja!" means "you are a filthy dog" in Zulu, and "Tsa mor kaka an eefa!” means "go eat shit and die" in Zulu. Let me know if this is inaccurate/what insults I can use instead.
> 
> ALSO i learned that mr. guthrie's name is joseph, and that mrs. guthrie's name is marion, so i changed their names partway through writing this. i'll work on changing the name from earlier sections. thanks!
> 
> in case anyone's curious, the reference to Ajapa (Tortoise) and what he did to those children is from the folktale "The Three Playful Children:" http://www.theyorubablog.com/ajapa-ati-omode-meta-enu-aimenu-ete-aimete-lo-nmu-oran-ba-ereke-the-tortoise-and-the-three-playful-children-a-mouth/
> 
> to read more about Ajapa and his particular brand of trickery v. Esu's, there's the JSTOR article called "Tortoise Tales and Yoruba Ethos" by Oyekan Owomoyela that i found to be helpful. 
> 
> of course, if anything here is inaccurate, please let me know and i'll edit the fic accordingly. thank you!


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